Annabeth Chase Vs The Internet
by ithinkabouttrees
Summary: The head councilors of each cabin are given a special reward; laptops! But what happens when someone with all the wisdom in the world is pitted against something with no wisdom at all? Insanity, that's what. It's Annabeth's first "normal" summer in a very long time, and things are about to get pretty crazy.
1. Prologue

Prologue: The Heroes and the gift of TEH INTERNETS.

It was a late afternoon when Chiron had called all the head councilors to the head cabin for a meeting.

"Heroes, it's high time we gave you a reward for all of your hard work. It's not easy dealing with entire cabins full of younger siblings now is it?" The older centaur commented. He moved over towards two large boxes, and used the tip of one of his arrows to cut them open.

"Hang on, Dell HP?" Annabeth remarked as she decoded the labels in her mind. "Chiron, are those… laptops?"

"Why yes they are Annabeth! You were always very observant." Chiron took out several smaller, rectangular boxes and placed them on the table in front of the demigods. "Each box should have your names on them. Inside is a computer that has been custom made to work with the energy interference here at Half-Blood. You should find that your laptop has a custom hard top design, and either a program or a video game that I thought you might enjoy."

"Oh man this is AWESOME." Leo opened his up to find a pattern with bronze cogs and gears, along with a copy of Ratchet and Clank.

"Yeah Chiron, you've really out done yourself!" Clarisse said with a big smile as she admired the flame design, and the copy of Dead Space.

The rest of the councilors opened their boxes and were having a great time comparing designs with one another. Piper was enjoying the fact that Chiron had chosen a sunset, and not something overtly girly like hearts; Will Solace took great pride in the fact that he got Robin Hood on his; and Percy was really stoked with his oceanic landscape and copy of Halo. After a full examination, he went to ask Annabeth what hers looked like.

"I really like the fact that he chose the owl," Annabeth remarked when he asked. "That was really accurate and cool, but Percy?"

"Yes Annabeth?"

"I've been out of the loop with video games for a while, with not living at home very often, and not having a lot of access to them. What's 'The Sims'?" She asked as she looked over the video game case. The game seemed to be about people, or more like making your own. Annabeth didn't see how this really suit her at all.

"Oh man you got the Sims? Lucky! Come over to my cabin, and I'll show you what it's all about. I think you're really going to enjoy it!"


	2. Chapter 1

Chapter 1: Annabeth makes Olympus. AGAIN.

"Ok, so you've got your people maker, right here. See? You can make whoever you want. It can be a real person, it can be made up, or have influences from real people, whatever you want." As Percy explained the inner workings of the Sims to Annabeth, she slowly began to understand that this could indeed be a really fun game. After setting up a Facebook and an instant messaging account, Percy and Annabeth had set to work on decoding the Sims together.

"So where do they live after you create them?" She asked.

"That's where the really cool part comes in, at least for you. You see, you have the option of story mode where to follow a path to being super rich and stuff, but then you also have "create a family" mode, where you can build your own house and fill it with whatever you want!" Percy responded while pointing to the screen to show her the options. Annabeth's head immediately started working on designs the second she heard the word "build."

"So you're telling me that I can build whatever I want? Anything?" She asked, as if it were too good to be true. This was like the game at the Lotus Hotel, only it wasn't trying to suck her soul just yet.

"Pretty much. Here, this cheat code should help. It will give you infinite money, so you can really go to town on what you can build. Anyways, I'm going to play Halo and then get some sleep. I'll see you tomorrow ok?" Annabeth barely heard what Percy had said, and barely noticed the goodnight peck on the cheek. She mumbled a halfhearted good night, and quickly went back to her own cabin before it got too dark. She was going to have so much fun with this.

"Ok, so I have the main floor as the base with the kitchen and living room, with all the rooms up top and Hades gets basement. Poseidon can have the swimming pool house as his normal area… Oh I almost forgot to put a chalkboard in Mom's room! Yeah that looks good!" Annabeth remarked to herself as she rebuilt what was essentially the Olympus version of the "Friends" apartment. Though she had had access to Daedalus' laptop for battle plans, blueprints, and the occasional movie streaming from Netflix, she had never thought about owning one herself until now, and boy was she living it up.

"OK time for entertainment. Now what would the Gods do if they were mortal? Play chess and poker that's what." As she added in more and more things to her newest creation, she began to realize how heavy her eyes were getting.

"For the love of Mom 'Beth go to bed!" Malcom whined from the bunk opposite of hers.

"Ok fine! Just let me…" she trailed off as she placed yet another fountain in the center gardens. Before she new it, her masterpiece was complete. A small-scale replica of the work she herself had done in Olympus was now sprawled out in front of her on her computer screen.

"Now for the inhabitance I suppose." She mused in her head. In no time flat, she had created all 12 of the Gods, kind of. Zues looked more like a blonde Hugh Jackman, and Demeter looked something like a cross between Naomi Watts and Betty White. Whether the flaws they suffered were from sleep deprivation or the ever so accurate Sim creator was up for debate. However, she was satisfied with the results. As she looked at the clock on her screen, she realized it was 2AM, and she had to be up at 7. With that, she closed her laptop, set her alarm, and drifted off to sleep.


	3. Chapter 2

**Chapter 2: Annabeth has some run ins with Free Will, both on and off line.**

The next morning came for too early for Annabeth's taste. She woke up, stumbled out of bed and into some clean clothes. She looked at herself in the mirror, and almost screamed. Dark circles loomed under her eyes, she was pale as a sheet, and her hair was a mess.

"There is only one thing to do at a time like this…" she remarked as she bolted out of the owl adorned cabin towards a bright pink one. After a very successful emergency make over by three of Aphrodite's daughters, Annabeth headed off to breakfast with the rest of her cabin.

"Someone could use a boost." Annabeth looked up from her half-cold oatmeal and saw Malcom smirking at her from across the table.

"Shut it Mal. Oh Gods my head…" Just as quickly as she told him to shut it, Malcom tapped her glass and said "Gamer Fuel." Suddenly, her glass filled with a red, fizzy liquid.

"I can't promise it will taste good, but as a gamer myself, I can promise that it will kick your brains ass with pure liquid adrenaline." Malcom said. He returned to his hard boiled eggs and toast, leaving Annabeth to try the "gamer fuel." Mal was right, it was like drinking watered down Gatorade with fizz and twice the sugar. However, it helped her fatigue, and made her function a whole lot better... At least for a second.

The first 4 hours of activities went by in blur, which was odd. Usually when she had caffeine it helped counteract the ADHD. This drink, however, sped her up times 10. She had been told twice to be quiet, and three times to stop tapping, once stop shaking her leg, and another time to put the very sharp javelin down because it's not for showing younger campers how to slay monsters. By the time her free period rolled around, her energy both physically and mentally had been drained. Usually, she would go for a swim or a run at this time, but at this point she decided it best to take a break.

"Lets see what the Sims have done while I was away." She logged on, and quickly discovered that certain things had gone awry. For one thing, Hera and Zues had taken over Ares' bed, and were currently watching TV, Athena had taken it upon herself to rearrange the furniture, and Apollo was refusing to shower.

"Of course… just my luck for making so many incredibly different people at one time and having them all live in the same house." After fixing up the majority of the main problems, she saw at the corner of her screen Artemis panicking. Zooming in to where the digital goddess was screaming, she saw the biggest problem of them all. Poseidon had tried to cook something, and in the process lit the kitchen on fire. She tried calling the fire department, but when they finally arrived all of the Gods were now standing around screaming at the inferno of a kitchen, much too busy to unluck the door to let them in. Now Annabeth was in a state of panic as she started mashing buttons to try and get everyone to put own the pixilated fire. Realizing nothing was working, she calmed down and paused the game, and then tried to think about what she should do. Her best plan, aside from letting the house burn down and just restarting everything, was to go ask the guy who taught her about Sims in the first place, Percy.

After a short walk to his cabin down by the lake, she knocked on the door, but to answer. The lights were on, so she was sure he was in there. She knocked again, no answer. The third time she knocked, she heard faint grunting noises coming from inside.

"Must be playing Pokemon with his headphones in again." She assumed, and opened the door. She instantly regretted that decision. She immediately closed the door, her entire face now bright red, and her mind viciously violated.

"Annabeth! I know this looks bad! I can honestly explain… uh yeah no I can't really… no it's pretty much what it looks like…" Percy said from the other side of the door. He sounded honestly flustered and embarrassed that his girlfriend had to see him at his worst.

"Out off all the things you could be using your laptop for, you chose to do THAT?" Annabeth growled through clenched teeth. As embarrassed as she was, her anger had now taken over as the dominant emotion. Is that really what he wanted? Was she no longer good enough? Why was there a riding crop involved?

"Look can we talk about this face to face?" Percy asked, honestly not wanting to talk to Annabeth through a door, and even more so wanting to keep this under wraps.

"I need a shower…" she mumbled, and she walked off back to her cabin.


	4. Chapter 3

**Chapter 3: Annabeth discovers Facebook and ponies**

After a reasonable lunch (as much as she could have of one before her mind decided to bring back up previous events), another round of activities, combat classes, war games, and a nice long shower, Annabeth slumped back unto her bunk. With the game still paused, she decided to go to plan B, which was still not "burn and restart", but to google what to do with panicking, flaming Sims. The internet proved to be very helpful, and she soon found a way to put out the fire, and return everything back to normal in her Sim world. She also took the liberty to check her new facebook.

"Piper McLain and Jason Grace are in a relationship."

"Katie Gardner made it to level 45 in Farmville."

"Nico di Angelo added The Cure and My Chemical Romance to favorite bands"

"Leo Valdez Status: I'm posting on the Internet and no one can stop me lol!"

"Well I guess I should update things. My wall looks a little bare." After filling up her facebook with several pictures (which she made sure were either misted over for her mortal friends or inconspicuous enough), a few blurbs of info, and some favorite things here and there, she decided to update her status.

"Now let's see…" she thought for a second, then wrote down "As my first status, I hereby state that I just saved a burning Sim house from total destruction. The Sims will thank me later. If not, I'm putting them all in the pool and removing the latter." After spell checking five times, she clicked submit.

No sooner had she done that, her instant messenger popped open, with a message from Percy.

AquaLad: Look, can we talk?

ChaseMe: What about?

AquaLad: Dont make me say it

ChaseMe: Let me ask this. Why?

AquaLad: I wuz bord, you were busy… and it was free

ChaseMe: 3 very not good reasons

AquaLad: Well it wasnt like I planned it happning

ChaseMe: Redtube magically opened and you just happened to have your pants unzipped? Oh yeah, totally legit Percy.

AquaLad: Well ok, ya I made thos things happn, but it wasnt like I planned it out. I didnt decide early that morning to do it, I kind of just did.

ChaseMe: Look, forget the whole thing and promise me you'll keep it to a minimum and never bring it up again.

AquaLad: Of course! I promise!

ChaseMe: Both things?

AquaLad: …yes

ChaseMe: Ok, fair enough. See you tonight at dinner and such.

*ChaseMe has logged off*

After that whole ordeal, Annabeth made her way back to facebook. She decided to look into some of her friends facebooks and see how they presented themselves. As unfamiliar as she was with facebook, she knew that people tended to stretch the truth when behind a pixilated screen.

Just as she thought, her friends had indeed pictured themselves very differently. For one thing, Conor and Travis Stoll had both claimed to hold the world record for fastest sprint, Pollux claimed to be able to out chug anyone, Clarisse openly stated that she would "kick anyone's ass that messed with her", and Piper had posted "Animal Farm" underneath her favorite books, even though she had told Annabeth that she had gotten half way through and ditched it. The only one who seemed to stay true to himself was Percy.

"Even though he can be disgusting, he's still genuine." She thought to herself with a slight smile. As she browsed through other's facebooks, she noticed that Will's picture was odd. She clicked on it for a closer look, and found that it was a picture of a My Little Pony with the caption "I will Love and Tolerate the Shit out of You." She also noticed that Percy, Pollux, and several other campers, both male and female, had liked it. Annabeth had no idea if Will was being ironic, stupid, funny, or a combination of the three. She opened her chat window.

ChaseMe: Will, why is your fb pic a pony?

ChillyWilly: U havnt heard?

ChaseMe: Uh no.

ChillyWilly: Friendship is Magic. Look it up bra.

ChaseMe: Ok, should I be scared?

ChillyWilly: No chicka, just embrace the friendship.

ChaseMe: Whatever you say Will.

*ChillyWilly has logged off*

Another trip to google, and after a failed attempt at typing in Friendship is Magic (which had come out first as "shfrendip si mgaic), provided a site by the name of "Equestria Daily." Upon further inspection, she found that it was a site dedicated to the newest incarnate of the My Little Pony animation franchise by the name of "Friendship is Magic." Even weirder was the fact that its fanbase seemed to be mostly older teens or people in their 20s. Even weirder than that was the fact that a good bit of the fans were male. She decided to write Will again and see what on earth had happened to the world to make them love ponies.

ChaseMe: Will, are you messing with me?

ChillyWilly: Nah bra, ponies are legit

ChaseMe: Seriously?

ChillyWilly: Ya. It's a good show. The ponies are alright dudette.

ChaseMe: So, what episode do I start with then?

ChillyWilly: yu got 30 mins till dinner, so start wif Winter Wrap Up

ChaseMe: You sure you're not messing with me?

ChillyWilly: Trust me Annie. I got your back.

ChaseMe: If you say so Will.

*ChaseMe has logged off*

Though still skeptical, Annabeth typed in the episode into YouTube and hit enter. In no time, she was watching colorful ponies prance across the screen to an amazing scripts and an even better musical number.

"Why the hay am I so drawn to this? …Oh Gods did I seriously just use the term 'hay'?" Annabeth found herself wondering as the episode had ended. Will was right. The show was indeed endearing, and as he would put it "legit." After the episode had ended, the dinner bell rang.


	5. Chapter 4

**Chapter 4: Annabeth Discovers Webcomics, YouTube and Old Gregg**

Dinner proved to be uneventful, as did capture the flag (her group had won, again.) Now it was on to campfire sing along which Annabeth had never disliked, but never really liked unless it was right after returning home from battle. Tonight, however, seemed to be in a more lighthearted mood.

"Hey you. Having fun with the internet?" Percy asked as he sat down next to her.

"Why yes I am! And I know for a fact that you are too." She replied given him a snide smile.

"I'm never going to live this down am I?"

"Yes you will, eventually. Anyways, have you heard of Friendship is Magic?" As soon as the words came out of her mouth, saying it in real life sounded very awkward and almost stupid. Percy gave her an interesting look.

"What's that look for?" Annabeth asked, nervous that she'd broken some sort of unspoken code of etiquette.

"I'm trying to think. If you're Twilight Sparkle, then who's Princess Celestia?"

Annabeth smiled at him and playfully shoved him. Will and his band started up the first round of songs for the night, starting with a loud and incredibly exuberant rendition of "I'll Make A Man Out of You", a camp favorite. Suddenly, Annabeth realized that stupid things might not be such a bad thing sometimes. Then she realized she had written to a pony in her head. Then she realized that she was ok with that. Then she wondered what the hell was wrong with her.

After singing songs of sheer stupidity all night, something that Apollo's cabin was fond of doing every Friday (which included the song Friday, It's the End of the World as We Know It, and many others), Annabeth and Percy walked back to the cabins.

"Have you heard of Lackadaisy?" Percy asked out of the blue.

"Is it a band or something?" She responded.

"No, it's a web comic I found today. It's really cool. I think you might like it. Also, you'll really like xkcd."

"Webcomics? Comics online?" She asked, now interested.

"Yeah, some of them are pretty awesome. Those two I stumbled upon when searching for Halo forums." Percy remarked. This had been the third time he had mentioned Halo in the past 30 minutes. Annabeth was starting to wonder how much of his brainpower he was losing to the screen. Then she wondered the same thing about herself after Winter Wrap Up replayed in her head for the 50th time.

"I'll look those up when I get inside. And Percy?"

"Yes?"

"Next time something comes… um… up during freetime, you can ask me to uh… help." Annabeth felt her face burning, but it was true. The only reason they hadn't done much before was because neither one of them had asked. She was starting to see that it was taking a toll on both of them.

"Huh? I'm not sure I follow…" Annabeth saw his mind click when his sea green eyes got very big, and his ears turned bright red.

"Oh… OH. Wow… really?" Percy looked about as flustered as he did earlier that day. And then she kissed him, hard.

"Good night Percy."

"Uh… yeah um… night."

Annabeth picked her computer up and set it on her lap.

"Ok lets see… x. k. c. d. and click." The web search had sent her to a website with words and stick figures. She didn't see how this could be funny until she read through a few. One was about infusing an apple with tin. Another was about using psychological warfare on people to drive them crazy, and another on turning camp fire songs into songs about being nerdy, and in love with someone's sister. Soon, she was giggling madly at the sheer genius of it all. Malcom on the other hand wasn't too fond of Annabeth's nonstop giggling getting in way of his Gears of War battle strategy time.

"What is so funny? Hang on move." Malcom said as he pushed his sister aside and almost off the bed. "Stick figures? Really? Ok you've lost… Oh my gods is that a reference to Joss Whedon?" Soon, both of them were giggling like mad men. Mal then had an idea come to mind.

"Mal what did you just type into my computer? This better not be some sort of horrifying fetish porn or something!" Annabeth protested as Mal spelled out Will It Blend into the YouTube search browser.

"Fetish what now? Do I look like I belong in that supermodel death trap they call Aphrodite's cabin? For gods sake Beth maybe the internet is really not such a good thing for you." He retorted, clicking on a youtube channel.

Annabeth was familiar with YouTube to an extent. She had used it for looking up clips on certain war strategies, music videos, and various other things, but never really got into the whole viral video culture. This new channel was foreign to her. They watched the first video where an older man stuck approximately twenty-five glow sticks into an industrial blender, creating what looked like a bucket of glowing radio active goo. And then there was another one where he blended an iPhone. Then they moved on to a rainbow cat flying through space, another one about demented unicorns on a journey, some clips of Doctor Who, and finally another about some guy screaming to leave Brittney alone. Annabeth had no idea where this was going, but she was fascinated.

"What's that?" A video in the recommendation tabs came up by the name of Old Gregg.

"Something that is so dumb that if you do end up watching it, you will quote it for life." Malcon responded with a look that Annabeth knew meant that they were watching it.

Cut to an hour later, and her head filled with what she could only describe as "The internet in a nutshell", Annabeth and Malcom passed out around 12AM. Annabeth was glad that she didn't have to get up in the morning, even though her night wasn't as late as last night.

The next morning, Annabeth felt better miles than she did yesterday, and decided to go for a run before breakfast. She tied her shoes, and pulled on her orange camp hoody and took off. Halfway down the path, she felt as though she was being watched. Suddenly, her paranoia was confirmed when out of nowhere, a gold arrow shot the tree branch right above her head.

"So, what did I tell ya? Ponies right?" Will said jumping down from the tree he was hiding in.

"Son of a harpy Will was that really necessary?" She asked as she pulled the arrow out of the branch and snapped it.

"Aw man… that was a really good arrow…" Will remarked as he watched Annabeth punish him for friendly fire.

"To answer your question, yes. Ponies are good. Which is surprising considering the fact that I'm the last person to be drawn in to multicolored equines singing about the weather and friendship. Go figure." Annabeth said as she walked along side Will. Will was one of those guys who were up to date on the trendy culture. His father, Apollo, god of music and poetry as well as light and medicine, was on spot with the current music trends flying around, and Will was no different. If there was a band that three people in the world had heard of, he was one of the three.

"So, what goes on the agenda for our fearless heroin today Ms. Chase?" He asked in his usual slang of grungy charm.

"I'm going to be outside as much as possible. Last night, I had a dream that the Spanish Inquisition was trying to fight Doctor Who and ponies with top hats. That can't be healthy… I don't think." She ended with a look of inner confusion on her face.

"Sounds like the time I went to a concert in Nevada. Crazy stuff yo. Hey listen, if you're going to be out, come play ninja tag with the group I have so carefully put together. It will be fun!" Will said, and then ran off into the camp to go gather up the rest of his troops.

Ninja tag at half blood is not the game where everyone stands in a circle. It's literally ninja tag. You run, jump, climb, sneak, and ambush people. It's all about being sneaky. And hurting each other. But it's all in good fun; no pain no gain as they say.

"Ok so I just have to figure out how to get behind Piper without her hearing me… which should prove almost impossible because of the fact she's standing in gravel. Awesome… hang on, Lucas is open! Bless Demeter for having battle inept children!" Annabeth ran through tactics in her head as she used the tree cover to maneuver around the wooded area they used as their battlefield. The game had not gone exactly as she planned out. First, she managed to get tag by Leo with a very hard left tackle, which rattled the inside of her head. Then, she tagged Clarisse by using her cap of invisibility, which was in hindsight was a terrible idea considering that Will called her out, getting her hat revoked for the rest of the game. Clarisse used that as an opportunity to tag Percy with her fist. Annabeth could feel the jolt he suffered from that one. Percy tagged Will, who in turn tagged Katie, who then used her plant manipulation to conjure some vines to tag Annabeth again. Annabeth found this completely unfair, seeing as how she wasn't able to use her cap, why should Katie use vines? At this point, Annabeth was done stalking Piper, and had moved on to another one of Demeter's children, Lucas.

As soon as Annabeth was able to get into a decent position above Lucas, she had an idea. It was stupid, but she was doing dumb things a lot lately.

"I'M OLD GREEEEG!" She yelled as she dropped down on top of Lucas, and flipped him. Staring at him from his newly found position on the ground, she smirked and ran off. She heard a voice running beside her as she darted as far away from Lucas as possible.

"Do ya love meh? Could ya learn to love meh?" Percy quoted as they ducked behind a large boulder.

"What brings you to my humble boulder?" She asked as he took something out of his jean pocket.

"This. Leo has managed to set up a huge projector in the secret bunker of cabin 9. Since the weekends are usually late nights for most cabins anyways, we're going to have a movie and video game night. You know, for the older campers. You have to have a card to get in though apparently. Leo likes being secret like." He handed her a card with the words "Club Nueve" on it.

"Alright, I'll be there. But if we end up watching Harry Potter, you are forbidden to make Hermione Granger jokes. My hair is not THAT curly." She remarked, remembering last time when Percy put two and two together and decided that Annabeth had a new nickname.

"Also you're it. BYE!" She darted off just as Lucas tagged Percy.

* * *

><p>AN: I'm sorry that this chapter is really long and full of filler, but I super promise that the next few chapters will have a running arc and be very entertaining. I'm currently in the process of working on where I want to go with this fic at the moment. I'm going to keep it a comedy, but I want to add in a somewhat dramatic subplot that will only take up minor space in a few chapters involving the 7+ months that Percy wasn't around in Heroes of Olympus, but I'm having a hard time figuring out where it should go. Not to worry though, I'm not going to go all dramatic and sickly romantic on all of you! Expect great things for this fic, because I'm having a blast with it, and I hope you all are too!<p>

P.S.: If you do not get something I mentioned in a chapter, please message me and I will graciously provide you with a link! Bueno!


	6. Chapter 5

**Chapter 5: Annabeth says Offensive Things to People Through a Headset**

The underground bunker reminded Annabeth of the Tardis; much bigger on the inside than it looked like on the outside. Everyone in the bunker was already having a great time as she walked into the porthole. Will and Piper had taken the liberty of blaring techno at disturbing volumes (thank gods the bunker was sound proof), Malcom and Leo were setting up the projector, Katie and Clarisse were managing to stay civil with each other while they watched and cheered on Travis and Pollux having an arm wrestling match, and Drew was busy trying to flirt with Malcom, but to little success. As she scanned her surroundings, Annabeth looked over to find Percy talking to a familiar figure in black jeans, a chain belt, aviator jacket, and a Rainbow Dash t-shirt.

"I didn't know you were a Brony Nico." Annabeth joked as she slid in on the couch next to Percy.

"Didn't take you for a pegasister Annabeth." Nico said returning the joke with a cheeky smile. The two hugged and greeted each other warmly, as it had been a while since they had seen each other. Nico loved to travel, and hated staying in one place for long periods of time.

"So, what's on the agenda for tonight guys?" She asked after sitting back down between them.

"Well first off, we're going to watch some good old fashion Rocky Horror. And then we're going to play some HALO online, courtesy of Leo's projector screen. Then after that, ponies." Percy nodded in agreement as Nico finished, and then took a sip of Gamer Fuel. Annabeth suppressed her gag reflex.

To everyone's great surprise, it was Clarisse that suggested Rocky Horror. Clarisse had first seen it when she and Silena (may the Gods bless her soul) in an act of teenage rebelliousness about 3 years ago had snuck off campus to go see a midnight showing, and cracked up the whole way through. Tonight, so did everyone else. Annabeth imagined that this was one of those films that are only good when you're with a group of people who all have a good sense of humor, or a group of people with an appreciation for manly legs in a garter belt.

"So Will, next Friday your cabin better do the Time Warp." Piper said after the ending credits rolled. Then, Leo busted out the controllers.

"Ladies and gentlemen, now it is time for the main event, HALO." He said in a mockingly regal tone. "However, this is not just any HALO, oh no my friends we've gone far beyond that. This is HALO online, with people around the world joining in for some brutal fun! Now, I need 3 volunteers!"

"Me, since I brought the game." Said Percy, taking the first controller.

"And I just want to blow shit up." Clarisse followed with a wild look in her eye.

"Hand the last one over here, I'll make sure these chumps don't die in the first two minutes." Malcom finished, taking the last.

"And now, headsets. Pick yours and adjust accordingly." Leo handed out wireless headsets to each of the players. "Let the games begin."

Online HALO was like watching war in space, while everyone is drunk and on acid. In other words, Annabeth couldn't keep a strait face through any of it because of how insane it was. Stuff was blowing up everywhere, people were driving off of cliffs in tanks, guys on the other side of the world were screaming profanities in European languages, players were running into things, and she was introduced to Teabagging. Everyone around her, including herself, was cracking up and the antics their fellow campers were getting into. After about a half hour, Annabeth decided she had to try out HALO for herself.

"Ok someone switch out I've got to try this!" Annabeth said walking over to the players.

"Yeah my hands need a break. Take my gear." Malcom handed his controller and headset over, and Annabeth geared up. Annabeth sat between Percy and Leo, who were both way too into the game to notice any change up at first. Annabeth was fairly new the controls still, but was able to adapt quickly and keep up.

At first, things went great. She was able to lead her team to the opposing side's base, kill many of the guards, and infiltrate. However, that's when things got messy.

"Percy, you're first, front and center, Leo after Percy. Head to the south quarter to take out enemies and meet Clare and I up on the 9th floor." Annabeth ordered her attacks, not caring if the other side heard her or not. If Annabeth had one talent, it was battle strategy. She was able to take out most of the other side's team without any harm, until a random headshot took out her player from an above tower. It was about that time another person started emerging, an entity only known in the bunker by Percy the last time he beat Annabeth in Chess.

"Ω για γαμώτο!" Annabeth swore in Greek. The other three looked at her with amused grins. "What?" She looked at the other players as if they were the crazy ones. "Let's keep going, I'm still good on respawns." The crew continued on, with the rest of them now swearing every so often in Greek as well as English. They were advancing well when a giant plasma blast took everyone out in one shot.

"Είστε γαμημένο Πλάκα μου κάνεις; Τι στο διάολο ήταν ότι μπάσταρδοι εξαπάτησης? " Annabeth was getting more graphic with her outbursts, which wasn't a huge problem for anyone, considering everyone in the bunker was getting a little ridiculous with every death. The marched on, until they reached the opposing base. With Annabeth's guidance, they managed to take out all the other players in the server.

"Ναι αυτό είναι σωστό! Πάρ 'το σκύλα!" Clarisse screamed as she stood up.

"That's what I'm talking about! Eat it! Eat it like your birthday cake bitches!" Leo exclaimed as he teabagged every body he could before respawn.

"OH WHAT NOW FOOLS?" Annabeth yelled into her headset. She had forgot that everyone on the server could here her outbursts.

"Μήπως απλά να νικήσει με ένα τσούρμο παιδιά? Ο άνθρωπος σκατά!" Annabeth froze as a familiar voice sounded through the headset, a voice that made Will's face turn an unnatural shade, a voice that was usually accompanied by various forms of poetry.

"… Apollo?" She asked back, hoping to the Gods that it wasn't. The gamer tag "IAmSoAwesome" didn't give her much hope. The other end remained silent for a minute, before the familiar voice talked again.

"Forget you saw me on here and I won't tell your mother." The voice sounded back. Suddenly, Mr. Awesome logged off. Everyone sat in silence for a second before Will lost his composure and began cracking up.

"Oh that's fantastic! I always knew that dad was a kid at heart, but this is rich!" Will managed through fits of laughter. He had greatly lightened the mood of awkwardness, and soon everyone was cracking up at the thought of Apollo sitting on a couch made of marble in Olympus playing Xbox.

After the several episodes of My Little Pony (which went over well with every one accept for Malcom who didn't seem to think ponies were legit) and some Doctor Who, everyone made their way blearily out of the bunker and back to their respective cabins. The night had been one of the most fun nights Annabeth had had in ages. She had almost forgotten what being stress free felt like.

"See, HALO is fun! I'm not wrong." Percy remarked as they wandered towards their cabins. They stopped in front of his cabin. It looked more like a beach house than a cabin, and had a very home like and secure sense to it. Annabeth knew that it was getting late, but something in the back of her head was preventing her from saying good night.

"Ok, you were right, happy?" She said as she put her arms around his neck and pulled him into a hug.

"Is something wrong?" Percy asked as he hugged back.

"Nothing really, I'm just not really tired." Her storm grey eyes flashed under the pale moon. At that sight, Percy's legs almost locked up. "Can I come in?" Percy didn't think twice.

* * *

><p>AN: Yes, you will need Google translate for the Greek, because it actually does say things. The next chapter or two will have the lime light shine on some other campers, and be a little less about Annabeth's internet escapades as much as it will be about Annabeth hanging out as normal teen now that she doesn't have any more quests, and seeing what she gets up to. The Sims will be back, there will be Percabeth, and you better believe it when I say haven't forgotten Camp Jupiter. Stay tuned.<p>

PS: The reason I update so fast is because I've actually been writing this fic for a long time. These are just the chapters that I get done editing, and release. I have many more chapters in progress. If there are mistakes blame my editor, not me.


	7. Chapter 6

**Chapter 6: Annabeth discovers Minecraft, and is a Bad Liar**

One of the things that Annabeth liked about Percy, aside from just about everything, was the fact that he was an only child. Normally, that wouldn't be that big of a deal for most people. However, when you live primarily in a camp where you have to share a cabin with a dozen of your brothers and sisters, having a significant other with no siblings means an empty cabin. Which means privacy and alone time. Which is exactly what Annabeth and Percy were having.

"Did I ever tell you that you always smell good?" Percy said from underneath Annabeth, who was busy staking her claim all down his neck with her lips.

"mmmhmmm." Was the mumbled reply. She was working her way down.

"Oh. That's nice…" Percy exhaled. He shuddered at her lips and tongue against his bare chest. Suddenly, his cell rang. "Don't bother picking it up, it's probably just one of my friends from school. They'll get over it." He said as Annabeth rolled off of him and reached for his phone on the bedside table.

"No, it's your mother. You should probably take this." She said as she tossed his phone to him.

"Oh ok yeah. She freaks if I don't pick up. I'll be right back I promise! Feel free to use whatever." He said as he quickly forgot his disappointment and hurried to the lakeside porch of the cabin. Annabeth took this opportunity to use his open computer to browse the web. She logged onto her facebook, and noticed that she was already getting some attention. People had liked her status, Piper and Clarisse had liked some of her pictures, and Percy requested her as the other half to his "in a relationship." Naturally, she clicked yes. As she was surfing around, Percy's instant messager popped up.

CapnHammer: Hey dude, u gotta check dis new game out calld minecraft

AquaLad: Hey Leo! This is Annabeth, I'm just using Percy's computer at the moment.

CapnHammer: Oh hey Annabeth. U kno what? Youd like dis game too. Look it up, its addicting

AquaLad: What is it?

CapnHammer: Think legos, but for teh internet

AquaLad: Ok, I'll let Percy know too.

CapnHammer: cool stuff. Ttyl

*CapnHammer has logged off*

After a quick download and tutorial, Annabeth had set to work with her new world. Minecraft was like the Sims, only no people, and blockier. She loved it. She had cut down some trees, mined some natural material, and created the beginnings of a log cabin. She also managed to get leather armor from an unlucky cow (which she smirked at, knowing Hera wouldn't be too pleased.) It took all of about 20 minutes, which was interrupted when she heard the porch door open and Percy walk back inside.

"How do you always know it's my mom calling and not one of my friends or something?" Percy asked as he walked over towards the bed.

"What friends?" She replied with a smirk.

"Oh, that's low. Like really low. I think I may need some ice for that burn." He joked as he lay back next to her.

"Leo messaged. He showed me this new game that's probably one of the coolest things I've ever seen. It's called minecraft." Annabeth explained as she moved over to let Percy onto the bed.

"Whoa. It's like legos online." Annabeth rolled her eyes at that comment. In no time, Percy was drawn into the game as much as she was. The two of them had forgotten all about previous engagements once they started to plan out and build things together. Annabeth had positioned herself into Percy's lap, and Percy was looking over her shoulder and pointing out where to go next, or what they should try and build. They ended up building a cabin mansion, a pool, a rollercoaster, several statues of things that didn't make much sense, and meeting up with some awkward looking sheep. It was funny; Annabeth was having just as good a time doing this with Percy as she was making out with him. It was nice to be able too find common ground with certain things outside of battle. Suddenly, their ears picked up on something unusual.

"Percy do you hear that?" Annabeth asked as they finished up another section of the block cabin. It was a distinct hissing sound like something dragging, or breathing.

"Yeah pan over… what is that?" Percy saw it before Annabeth. A green alien like thing was making its way over to the cabin mansion and it's statues. Percy didn't think it was friendly, and wanted to attack it head on. Annabeth on the other hand didn't want to jump into action until she knew exactly what it was. They soon found out that Percy was right about it not being friendly.

**KABOOOOOM!**

There went half of their hard work, and some of their sanity.

"WHAT THE HELL WAS THAT?" Annabeth shrieked. Percy was just as stunned, his eyes and mouth wide.

"My Gods. That little snot took down half of our block house with it! Does that happen often? Google it!" Percy was now just as mad as Annabeth was. A trip to google confirmed their fears.

"Yeah… yeah they're part of the game. Damn, I was really hoping this could be something I wouldn't have to keep playing defense with." She sighed and moved out of Percy's lap. "Well, my eyes hurt, and it's getting late. Better call it a night seaweed brain." Annabeth said as she closed the computer and put it on the desk.

"Oh man, it really is late." Percy remarked, looking at his phone, which said 2AM. "Yeah, I'll see you in the morning then." Percy seemed almost disappointed, and then Annabeth remembered what they had been doing before his mom called.

"Can I stop by tomorrow afternoon?" She said, barely looking over her shoulder at him while she made her way towards the door.

"You never have to ask. Just knock." He laughed, and got off the bed to open the door for her.

"I think I learned my lesson last time." She said. She kissed him good night, and headed off to her cabin to sleep off one hell of a night.

The next morning was Sunday, which at Half-Blood was chore day. Laundry, cleaning, restocking supplies, and fixing things were the chores that took up most of everyone's schedule. Annabeth had just finished her laundry, changed her bed sheets, and filled in an order for more of pretty much every toiletry ever by the time noon had rolled around. She headed over to the Sunday snack bar that was open throughout the day so people could come and get food as they pleased, and ordered a protein shake.

"Excuse ma'am, are you going to eat that dryer sheet?" A voice form behind her asked. She turned around to see Grover eyeing a dryer sheet that was hanging out of her back pocket.

"Nope, it's all yours." She handed it over to him. "So, what brings you to the camping grounds on the most boring day of the week?"

"Apparently, the Hunters are coming back tonight for and extended period of time. After all, they've run out of people to fight ever since last summer, just like we have. I want to be there to greet them." He said as they walked down towards the lake. Annabeth finished up her smoothie and handed Grover the cup.

"Really? I can't believe it! It's going to be great to see Thalia again! I wonder of Artemis will be joining them." She said as they walked towards the lake.

"My question is, do we keep this a secret or do we let everyone know early? I only told you because I know that you'd want to know about Thalia before anyone else." Grover had a point. Seeing everyone's reaction to the hunters would be awesome.

"I say we keep it under wraps. If anyone asks, we're having war games tonight." Annabeth replied. Grover nodded as he swallowed the rest of the smoothie cup.

"Will do. I'll see you before they arrive." He trotted off towards the woods.

After going for a swim with Piper and Katie, Annabeth threw on some clothes and went to pay Percy a visit.

*knock knock knock* "Percy!"

*knock knock knock* "Annabeth!" Came the reply from the other side of the door. Annabeth smiled at the reference. Percy opened up to a freshly cleaned cabin.

"Well someone's been busy today." She responded as he moved to let her in.

"Yep. All clean, even the sheets and towels. Mom would be proud." Percy remarked as he looked around. "What's in your backpack?" He asked, noticing that Annabeth was wearing her old hemp backpack, which seemed to be weighed down by something.

"I come bearing Sims." She replied as she shouldered off her backpack and pulled out her laptop. They sat in the same position as they did last night on the bed, with Annabeth in Percy's lap and Percy looking over her shoulder.

"Holy cow! You really did recreate Olympus, wise girl!" Percy exclaimed as she loaded up her current house. Her cheeks turned pink at his enthusiasm towards her work.

"Well, it's not like I get to visit my work all the time, so I thought why not bring it here?" She pointed at the screen. She started introducing Percy to the virtual Olympians. He found it funny that beings of pure power were playing poker, watching TV, and clubbing. Then again, Dionysus probably did all of those things in real life.

"And over there playing pool is Demeter. And that should be everyone." As she finished, Percy was busy watching the other Sims and their stats.

"So does Athena always rearrange things?" He asked as he watched the virtual goddess rearranged the bookshelf.

"Oh yeah, she does that a lot, but it's not as weird as some of the other things the other guys do. For instance, Hades constantly kicks the lawn flamingos, and Aphrodite brings someone different home every night. And by someone I mean anyone. Girl, guy, vampire, alien." Percy buried his face into her shoulder and tried not to laugh, knowing that Aphrodite wouldn't be too happy with him for doing so.

"Oh man why doesn't that surprise me in the slightest? I wonder what the others are- WHAT THE HELL IS THAT?" Percy almost screamed as a man in bunny suit hopped along screen towards Hades.

"Don't worry, that's the Social Bunny. Apparently, he's a good guy. Or at least I hope he's a good guy." Percy looked at her like she had gone crazy. "To be honest he freaks me out and I've tried to kill him several times." Annabeth admitted. Percy looked at her, and then cracked up again. They watched the Sims get into random antics for a while before Annabeth's computer started to run low on battery. As she closed it and put it back in her bag, Percy asked a question Annabeth had hoped to avoid.

"I noticed that you and Grover were talking. He hasn't been around in a while, what did he have to say?" He asked out of genuine curiosity, and normally Annabeth would have just told him what was going on, but she didn't want to ruin anything for tonight.

"Nothing in particular. Um… just you know… camp stuff I guess." She stammered out. She cringed inwardly remembering that she was a terrible liar, especially to him. Percy caught on to her instantly.

"Something tells me that's a half truth." He said raising an eyebrow.  
>"We just talked about how things were going now that everything is calm. Nothing serious."<p>

"You know you can tell me anything. There's no need to hide things from me."

Percy responded, now even more curious than he was before.

Annabeth was visibly nervous now, not knowing how to avoid the subject without seeming like she was denying something. Then she had an idea. She sat back down next to him on the bed and leaned into kiss him. She quickly realized she wasn't getting off that easily when Percy pushed her back down onto the bed, and straddled her using his knees to pin her arms above her head. She struggled to get out from underneath him, but to no success. He had her exactly where he wanted her, and she wasn't going anywhere anytime soon. At first she thought he was just going to leave her there until her arms went numb or she got too claustrophobic, but then a mischievous smirk spread across his face letting her know he had another plan.

"Ω Θεοί παρακαλώ όχι." She begged, understanding exactly what he had planned.

"Έχω τρόποι για να μιλάτε." Percy responded. His fingers quickly found his way to her sides and under her arms. Annabeth's struggle was futile as she erupted into a fit of uncontrollable giggles.

"The second you say you'll tell me what's going on, this all stops." He said as he continued to tickle up and down her sides. Trying to take in air between fits of laughter and protest was really starting to hurt, but Annabeth wasn't about to give in that easy.

"Nnn…No." She managed to choke out before laughter over took her again. Even though she was trying to tough it out until he got bored, she honestly didn't know how much more she could stand. Just as the tickling reached a very painful level, Percy stopped for a second and looked her in the eye.

"One more chance to tell me." Percy said as Annabeth caught her breath. She would regret what came out of her mouth next in a moment of unclear thinking.

"Or what?" She asked. She was answered with Percy flipping her attacking her weakest point, the backs of her knees.

"MERCY!" She squealed out of reflex. Percy let go of her legs and looked at her, expecting an answer from her now. As she was catching her breath, she heard horns sounding at the center of camp.

"Do we have visitors?" Percy asked. As the two of them stood up, and Percy was introduced to a hard punch to the gut that made him double over.

"That's payback. Follow me seaweed brain, I think the secrets out."

* * *

><p>AN: Here's your obligatory shipping chapter. Better enjoy it while you can, because the next few chapters are back into hilarity and general craziness. We're about to see some serious shit go down in terms of insanity on and off line, so put your party hats on because it's about to get crazy. Also, the last part of this chapter ended up a little more hot and heavy than intended. I was trying to write it as fun and cute, but it sounded fetishy as I reread it. Oh well, I still find it adorable.<p> 


	8. Chapter 7

**Chapter 7: Annabeth abuses Dubstep and then becomes a Frontier Psychiatrist **

Annabeth was down right giddy as they made there way to the fire pit. Whether it was because she was going to see some of her friends she hadn't seen in forever, or because she was still hopped up on endorphins was up for debate. The two of them were laughing their asses off at a story that Annabeth was trying to tell through fits of giggles (Percy was laughing more at Annabeth trying to tell him the story while cracking herself up than about the time she and Thalia put duct tape on the bottom of a gryphon's paws as a last resort in battle.)

"It was one of the most reckless things we've ever done, but it was like watching a 9 foot house cat!" She continued as they may there way to the fire pit.

"So you're sure that this big secret is awesome?" Percy was almost running at this point.

"Yes, I'm sure you'll appreciate it." Annabeth replied. Just as they reached the fire pit, a familiar face came into view.

"Hey look who's taller than me now!" Thalia ran over to her blonde friend, and the two embraced.

"My gods it's good to see you! Looks like the hunters have been treating you well." The last comment had oozed sarcasm, considering Thalia wasn't wearing her normal attire of black skinny jeans and rocker t's, but instead leather hunting pants and a green hooded tunic.

"Artemis made us go all formal for our arrival. Bleh. But whatever, we're here now! And look who it is, none other than Seaweed brain!" Thalia turned to Percy and disheveled his hair.

"Aw man, took me forever to get it right this morning! Man this is crazy, it's been too long!" As the trio made there way back towards the center of the pit, Percy and Annabeth were reintroduced to the hunters, and introduced to some new recruits. "So what brings you all back to the camp?" Percy asked.

"It's been an interesting year. We've started getting recruits, but we don't have much to do. It's all become so calm recently. So, instead of aimlessly wandering around hoping to find something to do, or fight, or claim, Artemis gave us permission to hang out here for a while." Thalia explained.

"You guys up for capture the flag or what?" The loud voice of Clarisse interjected.

"Yeah, let's do this thing!" Malcom responded, eager to show off some of his new battle strategies. Annabeth and Percy turned towards each other and nodded.

"Well Thalia, looks like we'll see you on the battle field to kick your butt." Annabeth challenged.

"We'll see about that." The hunter replied.

The cabins and hunters were divided into respective groups, each getting ready with their finest strategies, weapons, and intimidating game faces. As Annabeth was getting her chest plate strapped on, she over heard Leo and his sister Nyssa talking about using the sparsely used intercom system during battle.

"Look, I'm telling you that the hunters will never see it coming! I doubt they've even heard of dubstep, so it will distract them and freak them out while the rest of us who are used to it are given some kick ass battle music!" Leo proposed with earnest desire.

"I dunno Leo, it seems iffy. Not everyone knows about it, and even if they did, not everyone likes it. I say we hold off." Nyssa replied, skeptical at this use of the intercom.

"Pardon me interrupting, but what are you talking about and what is 'dubstep?'" Annabeth asked, curious as to what if anything could actually help beat the hunters at their best game. Leo, who was using his laptop at the moment to examine blueprints for a new war machine quickly brought up his iTunes and typed in "skrillex."

"This is dubstep." Leo said as turned on the first track. It started out as a slow techno song, and quickly escalated into what sounded like a mixture of Transformer noises and club music. Annabeth didn't hate it, but she had no idea who decided it was music.

"So you want to blare that over the loud speakers as a way to confuse the hunters?" She asked, mulling over the idea in her head.

"That's the idea yeah. I mean, I've only been up against the huntresses once, and they slaughtered us and then stayed up all night celebrating! It's hard to sleep through that kind of noise y'know!" Leo protested, eager to put his idea into play.

"Hey, maybe Leo is onto something. Even with you're smarts in the lead, we still get brutally beaten every time we fight them. This may be completely out of left field enough to work." Percy interjected.

"Look, as long as it works I don't care, I just want to win for once!" Clarisse stated, already pumped for battle.

"Music is a powerful thing man. Can't hurt to use it to our advantage." Will casually tossed in. The rest of the campers getting ready who had over heard weren't against it either.

"Alright fine, we'll use the loudspeakers to blare dubstep. Can't hurt to try I suppose. But, we still use battle plan number 10 as planned. Just because we're adding music doesn't mean we can all just charge down the field doing whatever." She glanced over at the king of unplanned, Percy. His ears turned red as he rolled his eyes.

"YES! All right! Nyssa, Nico come with me! We've got some speakers to re-wire!" Leo exclaimed as he grabbed his laptop and ran out the door of the armory. Nico, shrugged.

"Apparently I know my way around Dubstep. Don't worry, I'll keep everything in check." He said as he grabbed his iPod. Annabeth knew Nico was probably glad to get out of playing more than he was glad to help Leo, but she didn't say anything. She also knew this was going to get interesting.

The two groups lined up on either side of the battlefield, ready to fight for the other sides flag and to defend their own. Annabeth was in the front lines with Percy and Clarisse, looking over her shoulder towards the direction of the fuse box where Leo and his group were working.

"This better work." Clarisse growled, full of rage and ready to attack.

"Well, what have we got to lose? If they win, it just means they won for the millionth time. If it works, well then all the better." Percy responded, not too concerned either way. Annabeth admired him for always looking on the bright side of life, even when the odds looked bleak.

"Percy's right. Things can only go uphill for us." She turned towards the woods where Hectate and Demeter's cabins were hiding, ready to use magic and plant manipulation to catch the hunters off guard if anything went wrong. Annabeth took in a deep breath and raised her right hand, palm open, to signal hold. When the hunters charged, Annabeth clenched her fist, signaling charge. Just as her side went on the move, the speakers kicked in.

The music started slow and bassy, with the beat keeping an even tone for battle. Annabeth ducked, sliced, evaded, and ran through a hoard of hunters and campers towards her goal. She liked having a rhythm behind her movement. Then, the drop happened.

The drop was one of those moments in time where right before it happened, everything stops for a split second before devolving into madness. The second it happened, Annabeth felt the rhythm and beat in her bones. The music gave her an instant advantage, with the heavy beat almost charging her up like a generator and giving her a pounding beat to her attacks. She was a machine out on the battlefield. Catching glances around her, it looked like her fellow campers were doing much better with the music as well.

The hunters on the other hand, were very confused and offended by the mechanical music. When the drop happened, almost all of them stopped for a second to complain, or stopped because of sheer surprise. This let the half-bloods barrel their way through them and into their base. The hunters remained annoyed and confused while the dubstep blared on. Annabeth looked over to her right to see Percy leading Ares' cabin in a whirling storm of summersaults, spears and swords, crashing around and progressing forward towards the hunter's base. To her left, Will and Pollux and their cabins were advancing towards the hunter's flag. Demeter and Hectate's cabins were using up plants and magic to bring some huntresses down. The hunters struggled to concentrate and progress forward through the sound and human barrier. In no time, the half-bloods had over taken the flag and won a flawless victory.

"That's how you win capture the flag baby! All day 'err day son!" Will said as he ran down the field wearing the hunter's flag as a cape.

"I can't believe that worked! There is no way that should have worked! Oh man that was the coolest thing I've ever seen!" Percy said as he and Will strung the hunter's flag up onto the half-bloods pole.

"That was amazing! This is definitely going in my top 10 best battle strategies off all time!" Annabeth was more amazed and shocked at the fact that new age techno won them a battle than happy they won. Just as expected the huntresses were not pleased at all.

"The hell was that? That shouldn't be allowed! You guys cheated!" One of the newer hunter's exclaimed as the half-bloods celebrated their victory.

"Well, lets take it up with Chiron shall we?" Malcom said, trying to be civil. Just then, the Centaur appeared through the battlefield.

"Well, I must say that was a most interesting battle. Might I ask who decided to use this uh…"

"Dubstep… it was really my idea." Leo said as he appeared from his base near the circuitry board. He had a sheepish look on him that said he knew he was in trouble. Chiron looked at him with a cocked eyebrow.

"Well, look at it this way. You always said that really good fighters know how to use a variety of different tools to their advantage. It's not like we were using the music to cheat, we were using it as a different form of weaponry." Annabeth interjected, trying to stand up for Leo. She never thought she'd see the day where she would try to justify techno as a war tool.

"I don't mind that you used it, I mind that Leo didn't ask permission to use the speaker box before hand." He looked at Leo and continued. "You could have cut out the power in the entire camp had you not been careful. A weeks worth of stable duty." Leo crossed his arms and scowled at the ground. "For the rest of you, congratulations on your victory! Tonight, we celebrate the arrival of old friends and victory." The camp cheered as the hunters continued to seethe.

After the feast and partying, Annabeth and Malcom found themselves laying on the floor of their cabin looking up at the ceiling.

"I ate way too much… I may or may not be dead by morning." Annabeth complained as she attempted to sit up reach for her phone on her bed, which was now going off. She gave up when she couldn't find it beneath the pillow, and resorted to laying back down.

"I don't think I will move again for the next few days. Tell all of my classes I will miss them greatly. Actually scratch that last part." Malcom replied, forcing himself back onto his bunk. The two of them were exhausted from the impromptu dance party before the huge cook out, and felt ninety pounds heavier from eating fourths. Annabeth finally gave in and moved to her bunk, then checked her phone. It was a text from Percy saying something along the lines of how amazing she was today.

"Is it Percy?" Malcom asked from the screen of his PSP.

"How do you always know?" Annabeth asked half sarcastically.

"I can see your face turn red from here." Malcom was promptly introduced to a hastily thrown marker to the face.

"What are you watching anyways?" Annabeth asked, seeing his screen and realizing he was surfing the web.

"Go look up Frontier Psychiatrist on YouTube, thank me latter." He rolled over onto his stomach. Annabeth opened the computer and typed it in. What she got, she wasn't expecting.

The whole thing was music video taking place on a stage. There was no plot, but there were cowboys and Indians, an annoyed principle, therapy, horns, and techno.

"That was… interesting." She said as she tried to process the whole thing with little luck. Her head fuzzy and her bones sore, she turned off the lights and went to sleep.

* * *

><p>AN: 1) I'm very sorry for the delay in this chapter. I was out Halloween weekend and had no opportunity to edit or do any re-writes until yesterday. 2) I'm starting to think that chapters will be more or less like this one from now on with internet stuff seeping through, but it's not just Annabeth and co. chilling out online. 3) Oh the drama I have planned in the next chapter. Don't worry; it's good drama I promise. It will be funny. 4) If Annabeth and friends had Pokémon teams, who would they have?<p> 


	9. Chapter 8

**Chapter 8: Annabeth Finds Herself in Many Different Kinds of Rooms with Walls**

Annabeth was hastily awakened to one of her younger sisters, Ariadne, shaking her awake, looking very pale and frightened.

"Arry are you ok? Did you have nightmare?" Annabeth asked as she blearily looked at her alarm clock, which stated 6AM.

"Annie, there is a very large spider in the corner of the cabin. Over my bunk. It may be pregnant." Ariadne's voice shook as she tried to explain. Annabeth was wide-awake now. She new very well that there was one thing everyone in her cabin was afraid of due to a feud their mother had had with a spider queen. Annabeth and Arry were trying not to panic and wake up everyone else, but weren't doing such a good job when Annabeth shined her flashlight on the eight legged culprit. The wolf spider was about four inches from leg to leg, with a fat, round, hairy body sitting on top of what looked to be an egg sack. Annabeth had to stifle a whimper of sheer terror as she stared at it, and Ariadne had almost climbed onto Annabeth's back. Annabeth regained control of her body long enough to turn around and look Ariadne in the eye.

"Stay here, or on the porch, whatever. Just don't wake anyone, and I'll be right back with someone who can get rid of- OH SHIT IT MOVED." Annabeth almost yelled through her hushed tone.

"Go get Nico, I bet he can handle this." Ariadne said into Annabeth's ear. Annabeth nodded, threw on her hoodie, and ran out the door.

No sooner had she departed, she felt like she was being watched again. She heard the sound of someone dropping down from a rooftop behind her, and turned around.

"What are you doing up so early?" Nico asked, his black hood pulled over part of his face making him look like he could be Batman's son.

"Nico! Thank the Gods! Please come to my cabin and get rid of the demonic hell spawn of a spider we have in our cabin! It's pregnant!" Annabeth begged as she tried to tug him back to her cabin.

"Alright fine! But why can't you guys do it yourselves?" He asked, wondering why Annabeth was freaking out over something so ordinary as a spider, even if it was pregnant.

"Long story involving Athena and a spider lady. Enough talk, more exterminating!" The two ran back towards Athena's cabin. As they entered the door, Ariadne was huddled on Malcom's bed, the latter of which was wide-awake and shaking as badly as his sisters.

"Nico thank the Gods you're here! Kill it with fire!" Malcom hissed through his teeth, pointing towards the black mass of spider sitting on the wall. Nico walked up to it and examined it closely.

"Looks like just a normal wolf spider with a young egg sack. I'll take car of this." The three siblings almost fainted when Nico scooped the spider, eggs and all, up into his hands and carried it outside into the bushes. "It's all good. Wolf Spiders do bite if provoked a lot, but they're barely harmful to humans. If it happens again, come find me." Nico said as began to close the door behind him.

"Like I needed a lesson in the thing I hate most in the world." Malcom said as he rolled over onto his side and went back to sleep.

"Ugh. Spiders are awful. Wake me up when the horn blows." Ariadne said as she slumped back into her bed. Annabeth was still pretty buzzed after the whole ordeal, and she had to be up in half an hour anyways. She knew that Thalia was probably up and on her iPhone, and decided to see if she wanted to chat.

*ChaseMe has logged in*

ChaseMe: I can't sleep, are you awake?

TallyboBally: Yeh. Wats keeping u up?

ChaseMe: Big spider in my cabin. It's all good now, Nico to the rescue

TallyboBally: Haha that kids not afraid of NEthing

ChaseMe: Tell me about it. He picked it up with his hands and carried it out.

TallyboBally: Damn. Kids got mad skillz. Any whoozle, how goes things?

ChaseMe: How goes things? You looking for anything specific?

TallyboBally: Is Percy goin back 2 Jupiter NEtime soon?

ChaseMe: Unfortunately yes.

TallyboBally: Ugh. Sux 4 u

ChaseMe: I never thought I could dislike my own sibling

TallyboBally: Well shes only a half sibling, and Athena turned into a bitch in Rome. Reyna seems to have gottn that down

ChaseMe: LOL

*PiedPiper has requested to join the group*

ChaseMe: That's Piper. Say yes?

TallyboBally: Sure

*Request granted*

PiedPiper: What'r you guys doin up so early?

ChaseMe: Discussing a certain head of the Roman camp that isn't Jason

PiedPiper: That bitch almost took my man!

ChaseMe: That's what I'm afraid of now

TallyboBally: I c we hav turned into a Reyna hate club

ChaseMe: Whatever, I'm set in my opinion

PiedPiper: I take it Percy's making another trip?

ChaseMe: Yep.

PiedPiper: Oh, bummer. How come u arent going?

ChaseMe: I have you all to take care of, and I went the last time

TallyboBally: Dont worry about us, we will live

ChaseMe: Well there's the horn. See you all at breakfast

As Annabeth made her way to breakfast, a set of hands grabbed her hips and pulled her in for a hug from behind.

"When are you leaving?" Annabeth asked, the scent of ocean breeze giving away Percy's identity.

"Not until noon. You've still got some time to chew me out about the whole thing." He said as he let go of her. She turned around to do just that, but couldn't bring herself to complain. His face was genuinely sorry.

"I hate that you pull that look off so well." Annabeth sad, genuinely frustrated.

"You're probably going to hate me for the next few days regardless." Percy smiled and continued to walk towards the dining pavilion. "What're you going to do while I'm away?"

"Pretend that I don't care your gone and sulk probably." Annabeth answered truthfully. She had gotten better at letting Percy know how she felt instead of being cold and bitter if she was upset with him.

"Well that's good because that's probably what I'm going to do while I'm there." Percy smiled, and Annabeth almost melted.

"Keep your head strait. I don't want you getting off track and concentrating only on Poseidon's sector. The other Gods matter too." Annabeth teased, knowing he would play favorites.

"Don't you mean Neptune?" Percy joked. Annabeth had still not gotten used to using the Roman names, and probably never would.

"No, I don't. It's the Greek sector remember?" Annabeth loved giving him a hard time just as much as he liked giving her one.

"Oh fine. Anyways, I will see you before I leave." Percy said as he made his way to his own table. Annabeth didn't feel as bad about him leaving as she watched him go.

Unfortunately, Annabeth didn't take Percy's departure as well as she thought she would. Being separated from Percy had become incredibly hard ever since Hera had taken him away for eight months last summer. All she could do during her free period was lay on her bunk and look up at the ceiling, and try not to break down. Suddenly, the door swung open.

"Annabeth Chase, this is your rescue team. Prepare to laugh your ass off and forget about your pity party that no one else is invited to!" Thalia said as she led Piper, Katie, Drew, Nyssa, and Clarisse into the cabin. Annabeth rolled over onto her stomach and buried her face into her pillow.

"Let me sulk is peace." She mumbled through the fabric. As she went back to feeling sorry for herself, a large set of hands swept her off the bed and threw her over their owners shoulder.

"No can do. You're coming with us even if you hate us for it." Clarisse said as she carried her out the door. Rather than protest, Annabeth hung limp and let them take her wherever, knowing it would be better than anything she could think of.

"Fine. It's probably better for me anyways, even if you all are going to ritualistically sacrifice me." Annabeth quipped.

"Damn, you're an angsty bitch when Percy's not around." Thalia said as she chuckled at her friend's demeanor. They made their way to cabin number 9, where they settled into the hidden bunker. Clarisse placed Annabeth in one of the Lazy Boy recliners, and Annabeth proceeded to slump down into the chair. Thalia grabbed a DVD off the top of the TV, and stood in front of everyone.

"Welcome to Annabeth's pity party. I'm your host, Thalia. What we have here is terrifying, hilarious, and stupid, all unintentionally so. This movie is the worst movie ever made, and that is not an overstatement or a joke. I found this online in one of my many late night internet adventures back at camp Jupiter with Jason. Ladies, I present to you, The Room." Thalia popped the DVD into the player and pressed play.

"Trust me Annabeth, if you don't leave feeling something other than sadness, you have no soul." Piper said as she sat on the couch with a bowl of popcorn. The DVD started up, and the opening began. At first, Annabeth thought they were making her watch a sappy romantic comedy, which made her feel worse. Then, the dialog started. This movie was not anything that needed to be created. It was awful, with no redeeming qualities other than to be so bad it was good. There was hardly a plot, no character depth, and the dialog was so atrocious, it made everyone cringe.

"You are tearing me apart, Lisa!" Johnny, the so-called main character screamed in anguish. Annabeth cracked up at how bad and out of context the line reading was. As they continued on, things only got worse.

"Oh my gods what the hell is wrong with that girls neck?" Katie asked when one of the characters on screen's neck bulged from some sort of growth.

"I have no idea, but it may hatch." Clarisse said, laughing between mouthfuls of popcorn. Annabeth felt like she was watching the horrible sequel to Rocky Horror.

"Oh hi, Mark." Johnny was starting to turn into a surrealist figment of a man and less of an actual character as it continued.

"Can that be a thing now? Oh hi, Thalia. Oh hi, Chiron. Oh hi grass, Oh hi sword, Oh hi monsters." Piper said, and Annabeth nodded in agreement through tears of mirth.

"Oh hi Reyna! I did not hit her! I didn't!" Annabeth joked, and Thalia cracked up along with her. "This is probably the most horrifying thing I've ever seen."

"True that, but it's so good at the same time!" Thalia responded. Indeed, it was fantastic in it's own way.

After the movie had ended, Thalia and Annabeth headed towards the dining hall for dinner.

"Are you going to stalk her facebook?" Thalia asked as they walked along.

"Whose?" Annabeth gave Thalia a confused look, unsure of what her friend was getting at.

"Reyna. Apparently, Roman's can have computer access while attending college like she is. I bet she's updating progress both in camp and outside of camp." Thalia mentioned, cocking an eyebrow. Annabeth gave Thalia a mischievous half smile.

"Remind me to thank you later. I think I need to pay my computer a visit after dinner." Annabeth said, almost skipping with glee to her table.

"Ok, her profile is actually pretty clean. Let's check pictures." Thalia said. She had taken over Annabeth's computer, and was typing in names and stalking walls with a vengeance.

"Every single one of them is probably her posing with those two stupid dogs of hers." Annabeth griped. Truth by told, she was actually kind of jealous that she didn't have a cool pet. Reyna had Skippy and the grey hounds, Percy had Blackjack and Ms. O'Leary, and she was stuck with seven younger siblings to watch after.

"Nope, actually it's all the progress they've been making at Jupiter." Thalia remarked. They scrolled through some construction pictures, some other pictures of various campers, and then they came across something else entirely.

"Whoa, check out that statue dedicated to the Greeks! And hey, you're tagged in it!" Thalia exclaimed as she clicked on a picture of a large bronze statue that depicted all twelve Olympians in their Greek form standing in an outward facing circle, their respective Greek names written underneath them in the Ancient Greek text. Annabeth almost shed a tear when she saw it.

"I designed that." She half whispered, trying not to get emotional. It was very clear to her that Reyna had not only taken her half sister's designs into consideration, but had also credited Annabeth with the work. Suddenly, Annabeth's instant messenger popped open.

*Request for Conversation from ReynaofRome*

ReynaofRome: Did you see the picture?

Annabeth shoved Thalia aside, taking over as head typist.

ChaseMe: Yes! It's fantastic! Thank you so much for taking that into account!

ReynaofRome: I know we don't always see eye to eye, but I hope we can set aside our differences, and help create New Greece with the respect it deserves.

ChaseMe: I whole-heartedly agree! I'm glad we can finally start anew.

ReynaofRome: As glad I am, don't think this means I'm giving up on Percy.

ChaseMe: Pardon?

ReynaofRome: It's clear who the obvious choice here is.

ChaseMe: You touch him, I light you on fire.

ReynaofRome: Such harsh words from someone whose supposed to think things through.

ChaseMe: I mean it. I swear to the Gods I will come after you with a can of hairspray and a lighter.

ReynaofRome: We'll let him make his final choice. I'll see you in Jupiter in a few weeks. Until then, good night.

*ReynaofRome has Logged off*

"That horrible bitch!" Thalia squealed, reading over Annabeth's shoulder.

"I will cut her." Annabeth growled, now in an even worse mood than she ever was before. She was about to post horrible things about her on facebook when another window popped up.

AquaLad: Hey you, how goes things?

"Thalia, out. Now." Annabeth said over her shoulder. Thalia was not about to get in the way of this conversation and promptly got off the bed.

"Have fun, and don't go to bed angry. Also, if you want I can post a rumor that her father was Osama bin Laden." Thalia said as she received a pillow to the face. "Ok Ok I get it, I won't post anything. I'm out. Night!" Thalia swept out the door, closing it behind her.

ChaseMe: Things were going ok. Thalia introduced me to the best/worst movie ever called The Room.

AquaLad: and then wat happened?

ChaseMe: Then Reyna messaged saying that she's still going to fight me for you

AquaLad: WAT? Thats awful. I will talk with her about that

ChaseMe: The statue looks great though

AquaLad: It took some shoving on my part for them to build it.

ChaseMe: Figures

AquaLad: U kno Im yours forever right?

ChaseMe: Yes, but it doesn't make her any less of a bitch

AquaLad: She's not so bad to me, then again its a different story

ChaseMe: Come home soon ok?

AquaLad: 2 mor days and I'm there. I love you

ChaseMe: I love you too

AquaLad: I have to go, but tell everyone that everything is great here

ChaseMe: I will, and tell everyone hi for me.

Aqualad: Of course! Night!

ChaseMe: Goodnight, Percy

*AquaLad has logged off*

Annabeth shut down her computer and lay down on her back, looking up at the ceiling. It had been a long and emotional rollercoaster of a day, not helped by the fact that she knew she would have to return to New Rome soon and face Reyna. As she drifted off to sleep, the sound of her phone going off snapped her out of it. She picked up her phone to check the text message; unable to sleep without knowing who it was from. To her surprise, it was from Nico.

*Message from Nico*

2morrow, u me, Piper and Leo r goin 2 New Rome. Things r not goin as planned.

Annabeth was confused as to what it meant, and texted him back.

What does Hazel have to say?

*Message from Nico*

Reyna has the Roman's around her finger. No 1 is listening to Percy

"Damn! I knew something was up. Reyna is not going to live this down." Annabeth huffed. She shut her phone, and turned off the lights. She would need her sleep for the ass kicking she was about to dish out tomorrow.

* * *

><p>AN: I am so so so so so sorry for how long a gap this took, but let me explain. This is my senior year in high school, and I've been absolutely swamped with college apps, two thesis papers, and three major tests back to back to back. So, as you can see I've been very busy with not a lot of time to write. With all that being said, I will probably not update again until the end of November. There is good news that, and that is that I've already got most of the next few chapters planned out and one written, so all I have to do is fill in the gaps before I can post them. Another thing of awesome news: I've got my biggest fanfiction project yet in the works. I've been writing all my life as more than a hobby, but fanfiction is my chance to be creative as an artist with things familiar to me, and boy did I go over board. It takes place in the Percy Jackson universe at the same time as this story, but with three OC's that I've worked hard on making sure they're likable and most certainly not mary sues. That fic will be posted around early December. Before any of that happens, this fanfic is going to see some serious shit go down. Stay tuned!<p> 


	10. Chapter 9

**Chapter 9: Annabeth Enters Rage Kill Mode**

Annabeth seethed as she packed a backpack for Camp Jupiter.

"You sure this is a good idea?" Her sister, Ariadne asked.

"If I don't take care of this, it's only going to escalate." Annabeth said, examining her knife and attaching it to her belt. Ariadne had a worried look her face as she watched her sister pack, but said nothing else. A knock at the door and a quick entrance lead to Thalia flopping down on Annabeth's bunk with an excited smile.

"So if this ends up in a blood bath and you going to prison, can I have your iPod?" She asked, with a broad smile close to laughter. Annabeth responded by trying to smother her friend with a pillow as playfully as she could muster through her genuine fuming rage.

"One, it won't. Two, if it does, I'm giving my iPod to Ariadne. Three, get off my bunk; I actually made it this morning." Annabeth said, slinging her backpack onto her shoulder. "Alright, you make sure nothing happens while I'm gone. I'll be back by tomorrow afternoon if everything goes right." She instructed Thalia.

"Yes ma'am! I can't wait to see the Facebook statuses for this one!" Thalia said excitedly and clapped her hands.

"This can't and won't end well." Ariadne remarked, shaking her head.

Ariadne and Annabeth walked down the path towards the fairly new portal that had been erected in order for fast travel between both the camps in silence. Annabeth's demeanor made it perfectly clear to her sister that lecturing was not wanted, and Ariadne had no idea what else to talk about. Annabeth paid attention to the path in front of her, until the sound of running shoes hitting the ground came closer.

"Hey Annabeth! I wanted to talk to you before you left!" A voice from behind sounded. Annabeth turned around to see Apollo's newest camper, August, running up behind them. August turned off her iPod and moved her shaggy blonde hair out of her face and caught her breath. "I've heard that you and Reyna don't see eye to eye, but I don't think you should kick her ass just yet." August said, trying to reason with Annabeth.

"Oh? And who told you about my problem with Reyna?" Annabeth said, turning towards Ariadne, knowing that she and August were attached at the hip most of the time. Ariadne looked away sheepishly.

"Relax, she didn't tell anyone else." August said, diverting attention away from her friend. "Have you ever heard of Live Journal?" Annabeth raised an eyebrow at the name, hearing Piper mention it before.

"I don't know, maybe? What does this have to do with Jupiter?" Annabeth asked, annoyed with the interruption.

"It doesn't, but it's a nice place to just go and vent. I think I'd rather read your venting that have to get a note back from Jupiter about how to ended up in the middle of a massacre." August said, walking backwards in front of the duo down the path.

"Why does everyone think I'm going to kill her?" Annabeth mumbled with a face palm. August responded by moving to the right side of Annabeth and removing her knife from its sheath, cocking an eyebrow. Annabeth grabbed the knife back. "That's for protection! Nothing more!"

"Uh-huh, sure," August nodded her head, not convinced. "Anyways, I've got classes to go to and people to sing Journey songs with. But seriously, when you get the chance, check out Live Journal." With that, August took of down the path back to Half-Blood as the two sisters approached the portal.

"Please don't be too drastic." Ariadne begged right before Annabeth stepped through.

"Trust me when I say that this trip is purely business." Annabeth responded, trying to look convincing. Ariadne just rolled her eyes.

Once through the portal, Annabeth found herself face to face with a very angry Piper and a frustrated Nico.

"Annabeth! Thank the gods you're here!" Piper said, tugging Annabeth's arm towards the golden gates of New Rome. "They're having a meeting to discuss the progress and we need you to come and mediate before Percy loses his shit!"

"Whoa hang on," Annabeth stopped Piper from tugging her away long enough to ask a question. "What the hell is going on?" Nico stepped up to explain.

"Talk while walking," He motioned over his shoulder towards the gilded gates of New Rome. Annabeth and Piper followed. "The five cohorts have always treated each other like family. A dysfunctional family. Long story short, cohorts remain loyal to their heads more than each other. That speaks true in terms of Reyna versus Percy. Percy's got 5th and 4th Cohort on his side, but Reyna took the other three. The better three. Their loyalty will forever be to her unless Jason and Percy can prove otherwise." Nico explained as they walked up to the gate. Dropping their weapons off before entering, Annabeth was trying to calculate the best way to deal with things in her head.

"Option 1," She thought to herself, "I talk this out like a normal, diplomatic person and hope for the best. But that would never work because Reyna would prefer to talk over me… Option 2, I get Jason and Percy to side with me, and we politely but assertively ask her to stop being an awful person. But Percy's too nice and Jason knows better than the piss Reyna off…" Annabeth was quickly running out of options as the trio approached the conference hall. Annabeth had to think fast and efficiently, something she was literally born good at. Unfortunately, her brain quickly switched to rage kill mode upon entering through the double doors. Jason was sitting to the left of Percy in the middle, with Octavian sitting on the opposite side of the table. Two other Roman campers, Frank and Hazel took the two spots to the left of Jason. None of those campers were a problem, but Annabeth wasn't paying attention to them. Reyna was sitting at the round table to Percy's right, also known as Annabeth's spot. Annabeth had one last thought, "Option 3, kick ass and ask questions later."

"Annabeth?" Percy looked up from the animated discussion he was having with Reyna over blueprints, surprised to see Annabeth standing in the doorway, arms crossed with Nico and Piper standing behind her.

"Nice to see you too Percy." Annabeth said with obviously faked happiness, fuming that Percy let Reyna take his right hand side when she wasn't there. "Oh and hello Reyna." She said turning towards her rival. "I need to speak to you." She let her face go still, but obviously angry. Annabeth could have sworn she saw Reyna go slightly pale, but wasn't too sure. Reyna motioned for the trio to take a seat.

"I can see that you're not happy. Perhaps you'd like to discuss it with us?" Reyna said with a grin that only made Annabeth's anger that much worse.

"I didn't come here to discuss things, Reyna." Annabeth snapped, walking over to the table and taking a seat next to Octavian, who looked genuinely confused as to what was going on. "I came here to tell you that your leadership skills aren't working." Reyna cocked an eyebrow.

"Annabeth," Percy said in a calm tone, trying not to stir the pot, "I'm sure whatever it is you're mad about can be…"

"Percy, this isn't about you right now. This is between Reyna and I, and I think it's time for a new lead in this project." Annabeth said, cutting him off. Percy didn't dare challenge Annabeth in this kind of mood, and sunk back down in his chair.

"Not working? All that hard work we've been doing is not working?" Reyna half hissed through clenched teeth. Frank and Hazel looked ready to run, knowing that getting in the middle of this battle would be the last thing they would ever do. Octavian half smiled, waiting for the blood bath.

"Hard work? You call procrastinating on building any sort of Greek section hard work? I'd like to see the Greek housing and library section you put up if that's alright." Annabeth demanded, leaning back and crossing her arms. Reyna's eyes darted towards Percy for a split second, almost pleading for advice on what to do second before answering.

"I've been trying to get the job done, but some of my campers just don't want to pull their weight for such trivial things." Reyna answered, looking to the side like it was no big deal. From across the table, Percy could almost hear the fuse got off in Annabeth's head.

"Trivial? Really Reyna?" Annabeth asked with an angry, sarcastic tone. Reyna just shrugged from across the table, which was like waving a red flag at an angry bull. Annabeth lost her cool seeing Reyna act so smug. "You know what? Fuck you! That's it get up! I'm going to kick your pretentious Roman ass!" Annabeth snapped, jumping up from her chair and storming over to Reyna. No one was fast enough to stop Reyna from doing the same.

"Bring it you blonde haired spray tan bitch." Reyna responded, throwing a punch that Annabeth ducked. Annabeth managed to get in a swift claw to Reyna's face after straitening herself up. Nico and Piper were almost giddy with excitement.

"This is completely out of character for both of them, and I'm totally loving it." Nico leaned close to Piper and whispered.

"Your mother is a frigid prude!" Reyna choked out from a headlock Annabeth managed to trap her in.

"Better than a war hungry whore!" Annabeth managed to yell back before Percy ripped her off of Reyna.

"Holy shit! Ok, I don't know exactly what's going on here, but can we at least try and talk this out?" Percy begged, trying to contain Annabeth as she struggled against the death grip he had around her waist.

"This bitch is trying to ruin everything!" Annabeth yelled, trying to fight her way out of Percy's grip. She looked Reyna right in the eyes and continued. "Do you know how much time I spent planning New Greece out so your team wouldn't have to? Do you?" Annabeth snapped, still struggling. Jason had gotten in front of Reyna, in case she decided to take advantage of Annabeth's current position.

"Do you know how much time we spent correcting your mistakes? We could barely get passed the first blueprints!" Reyna snapped back, pointing viciously at Annabeth, as if to accuse her.

"That's not true! You've spent the last few weeks messing up the perfectly fine blueprints in favor of your own designs!" Percy argued. Reyna looked hurt at his words, but Annabeth hadn't listened as she ripped herself from Percy's arms and slam tackled Reyna to the ground.

"Is this how most arguments are settled these days?" Hazel asked her companion, Frank as the two girls ended up in an almost cartoonish catfight. Frank was too busy watching in shock to respond. Percy and Jason had given up trying to stop the fight, as getting the middle of flying fists and claws was a sucide mission.

"This is very unladylike of you and I will have you evicted and suspended from new Rome once I win!" Reyna yelled, putting Annabeth into a headlock and collapsing her knees, forcing her to kneel. Annabeth wasn't having any of it as she elbowed Reyna in the stomach, causing the grip to ease up. Annabeth quickly stood up and proceeded to spin around and swift kick to Reyna's ribs, sending her tumbling sideways. Just as Reyna stood up and was ready to backhand Annabeth, a booming voice sounded through the chamber.

"ENOUGH." The owner of the voice sounded angry and proud; a voice that Annabeth knew too well. Annabeth hesitantly turned around to see a fuming Chiron standing in the doorway, with an equally angry and equally fuming Lupa standing next to him. Reyna stopped mid punch and quickly stood up strait, not wanting to further her punishments.

"You two do realize that you're in New Rome? A sacred, non-violent city dedicated to the protection of demigods?" Lupa barked, looking like she may kill someone at any second. Annabeth glanced over at Percy, who looked like he might faint. It was pretty clear that she had messed up, big time.

Annabeth sat in a chair opposite Chiron at the table in the big house. After breaking up the fight, Chiron had all but dragged Annabeth back to Half-Blood, with Lupa doing the same to Reyna, both leaders looking like they may snap at any minute.

"How did you find out I was there?" Annabeth asked after getting fed up with the silence of Chiron just staring at her, deciding what to do.

"Ariadne told me." Chiron responded, not letting his face show any expression. Annabeth squirmed under his gaze, knowing that Ariadne had been right. This did end just as badly as she said it would. Annabeth broke the silence again, trying to get her punishment over with.

"So I guess I'm in for a world of hurt now aren't…"

"What happened? How could you possibly think getting into a brawl with Reyna was a good idea? I know you're a fighter Annabeth, but I'll be damned if I've ever seen you do something so…" Chiron shook his head trying to think of the right word, and settled on one that cut like a knife, "Stupid. What you did was incredibly stupid and impulsive. I'd expect this from a child of Apollo or Ares, but a child of Athena? Not to mention the favorite of Athena? Annabeth, what on earth could have gone through your head?" Chiron finished, looking at Annabeth with a face that was more worried than angry. Annabeth didn't dare look up, hot, angry, and more prominently, embarrassed tears stingy the side of her eyes.

"You have no idea what she's done to me, my work, and my friends over the past months." Annabeth growled, still not looking up.

"Then why don't you explain it to me?" Chiron demanded, folding his hands on the table, waiting.

"She's ignored all of my plans, there was no progress being made in New Rome towards the Greek section, belittles the Greek campers, and has pretty much wrapped her cohorts around her finger. Without their lead, the rest of us are powerless!" Annabeth explained, getting angrier with each point.

"Calm down, Annabeth. I understand Reyna hasn't exactly been your best asset in this project. I too haven't seen much in the ways of work on her part, and by the looks of the "progress" she's made," Chiron said, using air-quotes around the word progress, "she's probably slacking off just to spite you." Chiron finished, looking a little more sympathetic.

"Why on earth would she do that?" Annabeth asked. "She has no reason to be spiteful, I've done nothing to make her angry at me in the first place until now." Annabeth whined, not sure how that was possible.

"Maybe because you're a threat perhaps?" Chiron asked, cocking an eyebrow. "Out of all the campers in both camps, you're the only one who can out smart her, out fight her, and out do her in any match. Did you ever stop to think that maybe Reyna doesn't want to take your lead because she thinks the other campers know that?" Chiron asked rhetorically. Annabeth sat there in silence, not knowing how to respond. She felt an overwhelming sense of pride wash over her; Reyna feared her for her greatness. But, Annabeth let her hubris be taken over by an underlying but equally strong current of guilt. Annabeth knew what it was like to not feel good enough, to feel like no one in the world was listening, and yet here she was having beaten up someone who felt the exact same way towards her.

"I think I get it." Annabeth sighed, feeling really bad about how she acted today for the first time since she had gotten back to camp.

"I thought you might. I understand that letting someone take over for you is hard, but I also understand that things haven't panned out as we've planned. I'm letting you off easy this time. Stable duty for a week, and you're not allowed back to New Rome during that time." Chiron concluded, standing up and leading Annabeth towards the door. "Once the week is up, you may go back and take over the building process along side Jason."

"Fine." Annabeth said, walking towards the door. "Anything else?" Chiron looked at her pensively, then nodded.

"Maybe you should think about taking your anger out in more… creative ways?" Chiron half asked, half instructed. Annabeth nodded and headed back towards her cabin. She felt awful and ashamed of herself, and knew that killing some Sims in brutally horrible, SAW like ways might make her feel better. 

* * *

><p>AN: I… I think I updated. Holy crap guys, I never thought I'd see the light of updating ever again! So, let's get this over with: I'M MORE SORRY THAN ANY OF YOU COULD EVER KNOW. PLEASE FORGIVE ME FOR BEING A HORRIBLE HORRIBLE UPDATER, AND LET ME MAKE IT UP TO YOU. That being said, but to updates. So, the past month has been filled with more work that should be legal, with leading up to finals next week starting on Wednesday, and I've been absolutely deadlocked and in no position to work on my fanfics at all. In fact, I've been pretty much sapped of all creativity, so this chapter admittedly kind of sucks. BUT, there are some early bird cameos in this chapter from my next fanfic coming in January, and after this week, expect 2 updates a week! Next chapter gets back into more computernerd/gaming/internet culture, so it will be a little bit more like the earlier chapters. Also, there won't be so much drama going on for a while, but a whole lot more comedy. I'd like to take this time to thank you all for sticking with me through this hell hole of a month, and I dedicate this chapter (even though it kind of sucks and I'm sorry) to the user by the pen name "windharmony", because she had a birthday on the first of Dec, which was my original planned update day! Thanks again for your support guys!


	11. Chapter 10

**Chapter 10: Annabeth Takes Advice from a Friend and then Discovers Fandoms**

Annabeth had had a terrible rest of the day after her return and punishment. Thalia and Ariadne wouldn't even dare go near her, much less say anything along the lines of "I told you so." Percy wouldn't be home until later that evening, so she couldn't apologize just yet. She didn't really want to face him anyways; shame and embarrassment prevented his return from being an anticipated one. Instead of facing the day head on like she normally would have done, letting her hubris take over, she resorted to slumping down on her bunk and silently crying. It was almost a natural thing for her to be assertive and angry when she was jealous and territorial, Rachel had taught her that about her self several summers ago. It was not natural however for her to fly off the handle like that, especially in front of the people who manage a lot of her social and business life, especially in front of Percy. The whole ordeal gave her a deep sense of shame the more she thought about it. Just as she was really getting into her self-pity, two sets of footsteps and two giggling voices came into earshot on the porch of the cabin. Annabeth recognized the duo as her sister, Ariadne, and her newest best friend with whom she had spoken with earlier, August. Annabeth listened carefully as the voices got hushed, knowing they were probably trying not to disturb her as they talked about her. She only caught pieces of what they were saying, Ariadne mentioning something about "a bad mood" and "best not to mess with her", with August responding with something along the lines of "left my iPod inside" and "need it back." With that, the door swung open quietly, and the two sets of footsteps made their way inside. Annabeth pretended to be asleep so they wouldn't be tempted to bother her. The footsteps made their way to the back of the cabin towards the bookshelves; well one of them did anyways. The other set stopped next to her bunk and let out a sigh.

"August!" Ariadne whispered vehemently, "I told you to leave her alone!"

"I know but…" August whispered back and trailed off. Another sigh escaped August's nostrils before she continued. "I know what it's like to lose my temper and it's not fun at all. I just want to know if she's ok or not. Maybe we could talk or something, I dunno." August said in a worried tone that made Annabeth almost start crying again. For someone who had only been at Half-Blood about a week and had known her for less time than that, Annabeth was moved at how much August cared.

"It's very nice that you care, but leave the poor girl alone for right now. You two can talk later. Now where did you leave it?" Ariadne asked, a little more afraid of Annabeth's wrath than her friend. August mumbled something about the loft upstairs, which held mostly old books and battle plans. Ariadne groaned.

"Stay here, don't wake her. I'll find it and be right back down." Ariadne whispered in an annoyed tone as she climbed the later upwards. Annabeth heard a slumping sound next to her bunk and then breathing, implying that August had taken a seat.

"I know you're awake. It's ok though, you don't have to talk to me." August said, tapping on something that was making a rhythmic sound; something common for Apollo's cabin when they were nervous. She paused before starting again. "I know I'm not you. Hell, no one is you. From what I hear, you're the bomb dot com, always in charge and stuff." Annabeth almost laughed at August's use of expressions but stifled it, interested in what August had to say. "You may be only half human, but half is enough to make some mistakes. Don't be too hard on yourself ok? People do stupid shit, but they move on. I know that you think you're above making dumb choices, but mistakes are what make us better people in the long run." Annabeth liked this new camper, but silently cursed Apollo for having children who knew their way around words. Her depression was no longer lingering as she took August's words to heart, and she could no longer enjoy her pity party. Just as she was about to get up and address August herself, she heard movement and felt the other side of her bunk sag a little. "Also, sulking causes a lot of stress. I should know, it happened to me during finals." August finished, sighing again. Annabeth knew August was sitting on the side of her bunk, but she honestly didn't mind. The peace was quickly interrupted as Ariadne's footsteps made their way down the ladder to the loft.

"For fuck's sake August what did I tell you!" Ariadne squealed. Annabeth turned over onto her stomach to see August with a terrified look on her face and her younger sister running over towards her friend, about to kill her. Annabeth sat up and motioned for Ariadne to stop.

"It's fine Arry, August was just trying to help." Annabeth explained, wiping her eyes. August smiled at her, looking glad that she could help.

"It's not that. After I told her not to, she goes ahead and does whatever she pleases. I swear, it's like you do the opposite of whatever I tell you at all times." Ariadne complained, picking up Annabeth's extra pillow and lugging it at August. Annabeth chuckled as August rolled her eyes and Ariadne huffed in frustration. The two of them reminded her of Thalia and herself. As August stood up to challenge Ariadne with the pillow, August's shirt had caught Annabeth's attention.

"August?" Annabeth said, causing August to abandon her revenge and look at Annabeth. "Is that a Firefly t-shirt?" August looked down at her t-shirt of a large steampunk looking spaceship on the front, with the word "Firefly" scrolled across the top in golden cursive. August smiled and nodded.

"Yup. Browncoat for life! You?" August smiled again, looking as happy as ever now that she had someone else to bond with over sci-fi. Annabeth was indeed a Browncoat, having gotten the DVD's for Christmas the past year and falling in love with it. Ariadne face-palmed, not wanting Annabeth to start bringing up how much she thought Ariadne looked like River Tam.

"They can't take the sky from me either." Annabeth quoted. August high fived her for the reference.

"Well we should best be off. Take the rest of the day off still." Ariadne instructed Annabeth like a young nurse. "I don't want you to tire yourself out too much."

"Yes yes I understand. Now out you two. I know that you've got classes to get to." Annabeth ordered as the two of them skittered out into the camp again. She lay back on her bunk, feeling better now that she knew her friends loved and respected her no matter what. Whether out of fear or not was still up for debate, but she shoved that thought out of her head. Knowing she had the rest of the day off, Annabeth grabbed her sketchbook and pencil. Blueprinting had always calmed her down, and she had been working on some massive plans for her imaginary dream home that she would build in the Bahamas with Percy. It was a silly, but not implausible; he was the son of the sea god after all. However, her hands weren't really interested in drawing that as she stared down at the blank grid page that should have been dedicated to the second story balcony. Instead, the Firefly theme song played over in her head.

"They can't take the sky from me." She mumbled to herself as she managed to sketch out a pretty detailed outline of the airship, Serenity. Annabeth managed to lose track of time as she worked on it's detail and figure. Everything had to be perfect; this was Serenity she was drawing. As she finished the final lines of the port side, her brother came walking in.

"Heard you lost it back there." Malcom mentioned as he flopped down onto his bunk and opened his DS.

"I'm not going to talk to you if you're just going to talk about that. I feel bad enough about it as is." Annabeth responded, dusting of some eraser marks from her work. Malcom looked at her from his video games, feeling a little guilty about giving her a hard time.

"So…" He started, trying to break the awkward silence, "Blueprints?"

"Nope." Annabeth replied curtly, "Serenity." Malcoms eyes went wide as he slipped off his bed and looked over his sister's shoulder.

"Holy crap Beth that's awesome!" He complimented, also being a Firefly fan. "You gotta post that on DeviantArt!" Annabeth looked at him oddly. "DeviantArt is an art sharing site. Go check it out." Malcom recommended, taking the sketchbook from Annabeth and admiring her work. Annabeth once again pulled out her laptop and typed in the web address.

"So this site is where people can post whatever art stuff they want then?" Annabeth asked, scrolling through the homepage. She liked the idea of an entire website dedicated to sharing the different arts. She wondered if her mother had anything to do with it's founding, or at least a sibling.

"Pretty much. Scan this sucker into your computer and post that shit." Malcom demanded, pointing to the printer in the corner of the room that was mainly used to print out blueprints and battle plans.

"Alright, no need for such harsh language." Annabeth chided, taking the sketchbook and the computer over to the printer. In no time, she had scanned her artwork onto her computer, set up an account on DeviantArt, and posted her masterpiece. As she waited for comments, she took the opportunity to search other's artwork. Many artists were amazing; painters, photographers, and writers alike all gathered to show off their talents. Some were underwhelming, but Annabeth chose not to let her opinions be voiced just yet. Best to build up a reputation of power and then attack was what her mother had stood for. As she lurked around, something caught her attention on certain works of fan art. Some artists belonged to groups dedicated to certain shows, and some delved deeper, dedicating themselves to certain couples or characters within the shows.

"Finding it interesting?" Malcom asked, only half interested since he was so caught up in his beloved video games. Annabeth was interested in the site, but had turned her attention to a certain group.

"These people are delusional! There is no way in Hades that Rose was a better companion to the Doctor than Amy!" Annabeth complained, having stumbled across a Doctor Who group dedicated to the pairing of Rose/Doctor. Annabeth usually wasn't one for romance or drama, but Doctor Who was something she took rather seriously considering it was the only show she had kept up with since she was younger. She was offended that there were people who thought that Rose could have been a better companion when Amy's story was clearly superior, at least in her mind.

"Easy there Beth, people have opinions too." Malcom chided, still not completely interested.

"Well these opinions aren't right." Annabeth grumbled, scrolling through the topic of discussion. "And none of them can spell! I'm dyslexic and I can tell!" Annabeth whined, disgusted at the level of ineptitude of her fandom.

"It's the internet. Did you honestly expect any form of decency?" Malcom asked, slightly amused at his sister's disgust.

"From Doctor Who fans at least." Annabeth huffed. She closed the computer and went back to drawing in her sketchbook. She still didn't feel like drawing blueprints, so she ended up sketching out Captain Mal in an action pose, holding out his revolver towards a currently not drawn enemy. Annabeth admired her work, not even sure if she could draw people well. Mal had turned out rather well, but something in the back of her head told her that he looked like an older version of Percy more than Nathan Fillion.

"Watcha drawing now?" Malcom asked, again caught up in his screens. Annabeth gnawed on her pencil as she looked down at her drawing.

"Who would be a worthy opponent for Captain Mal?" Annabeth asked her brother. Malcom paused his game and got up to look over Annabeth's shoulder again.

"Well, he looks like he's really battling it out in that pose. Maybe think about someone not in Firefly." Malcom suggested. He had always enjoyed science fiction, and was even the one who gave Annabeth the Firefly DVDs for Christmas. He loved that his name was akin to the star hero as well. "Maybe try someone more… I dunno… spacey."

"Spacey? Really Malcom?" Annabeth looked at her brother like he had just started speaking Mandarin. "You see, this is why I'm the favorite. Mother would never approve of such anti-language."

"No, you're the favorite because you take after mom the most. By the way, that comment is coming from a girl who has used the words "timey-wimey" and "wibbly" on many occasions." Malcom shot back, going back to his games.

"In context! I was talking about Doctor Who." Annabeth responded. Then, she got an idea, and her hands went flying across the paper. It took her no time to complete the basic sketch before Malcom interjected again.

"Inspired much?" Malcom commented, now more fascinated with his sister's intense focus than his own games.

"And done." Annabeth said, dusting off the paper and holding it up. She had successfully drawing the 11th Doctor dueling it out with his Sonic Screwdriver against Captain Mal and his Revolver. "Is it good?"

"Fantastic! I'm pretty sure that's the biggest nerdgasm I've ever seen on paper, and it's completely amazing!" Malcom was almost as ecstatic at Annabeth's drawing than she was. "Post it!" He demanded, pointing at the scanner.

"Nergasm? Again with the non-words. I swear if it weren't for your eyes and naturally ability to process like a computer, I'd think you were an Apollonite." Annabeth commented, scanning her picture and posting it to her newly made account. "So what happens after I post it?"

"People comment and say if they like it or not." Malcom responded watching Annabeth mess with her account. "Oh hey look! First comment!" Malcom moved Annabeth's hand and clicked on the image to bring up the comments.

"Apparently TardisMaster65 really wants Doctor Who to kick Mal's ass." Annabeth said, reading the very misspelled and very 'colorful' comment.

"The one underneath it is even worse, and it's on Mal's side… oh gods that's harsh." Mal grumbled, reading the comment that had just appeared which had far worse grammar and language, if that was possible.

"Oh gods they keep appearing every time I refresh!" Annabeth panicked, watching the ensuing cyber fight before her escalate. "I just drew a picture! Why do people think I'm attacking their shows?"

"This is what is called a fandom war." Malcom explained, slightly mortified at the insults being thrown back and forth. "They happen sometimes, and there isn't a whole lot you can do about it."

"So you're basically telling me that fans use the internet to argue with each other over things that don't need to be argued over?" Annabeth concluded, still trying to figure out what was going on.

"Yeah, pretty much. Welcome to the internet." Malcom said with a hearty pat to Annabeth's shoulder. Annabeth took a deep breath and exhaled before speaking, still fixated on the screen.

"The internet sucks."

* * *

><p>AN: A few things before updates:<p>

1)This chapter wraps up the Reyna Vs Annabeth side story.

2)I know that Malcom (yes that is how you spell his name in the books) has never been given an official personality, and is really implied to be a generic Athenian. However, I liked the idea of an equal for Annabeth to bounce comments and banter off of, so I ended up kind of giving him a mix between my personality (the gamer with the deadpan sarcasm and lover of sci-fi) and my good friend Kent's (crude language and humor) with Annabeth's brain. So if you ever wanted to know how I write for him, that's pretty much it.

Now then, LIFE UPDATES TIME YAY! So first of all, I'm going to have loads of free time in the next few weeks. So prepare for trouble, and make it double because my second fan fiction just got released! It's called **The Punk and the God Father.** If you like what you see here, maybe go check it out! So, here's a heads up about this fic; I may be throwing a pretty heavily lemon scented chapter at you next chapter. Though I'm not going to just strait up write a porno (for various reasons, namely I'm lazy and hate writing detail) implications will be heavy handed. So that being said, be prepared. That's about it. Happy Holidays everyone!


	12. Chapter 11

**Chapter 11: Annabeth Discovers Percy's Hidden Talent and then meets the Mean Girls**

After an afternoon of facepalming over how idiotic fans could be with her brother, Annabeth decided to get some fresh air. It was later in the evening, just after dinner, and the sun was setting a very lovely gold over the lake as she sat on the dock. Percy would be home any minute, and he was bound to stop at the dock, just like every night before he went to his cabin for the evening. Just like clockwork, Annabeth saw him sit next to her out of the corner of her eye.

"So, feeling better?" He asked tentatively, as if the question was itself dangerous. Annabeth sighed and keep staring strait ahead, hugging her knees into herself like she had always done when she was feeling anxious.

"I was completely stupid and horrible today, and I'm so sorry that I lost it." She said, barely above a whisper. Annabeth felt Percy put his arm around her waist and pull her in.

"It may not have been your smartest move, but I'm sure most of us wanted to do the same thing." Percy told her, resting his chin on her head. Annabeth perked up hearing that.

"Really? But I thought you and Reyna got along." Upon hear that, Percy shook his head, looking at Annabeth like she had lost it.

"No! We've never seen eye to eye, even when she is trying to flirt with me." Percy said, twirling a piece of her hair in his fingers.

"Seriously?" Annabeth couldn't believe her ears, or maybe she could. Percy's other fatal flaw, besides personal loyalty, was that he was incredibly nice. Sure, he could lose his temper at times, but it was only in the line of actual fire, or if he was being physically threatened as a last resort. Other than that, Percy didn't like to argue, he didn't like to pick unnecessary fights, and he always tried to get on people's good sides first. It was one of the things she loved about him. It suddenly made sense to Annabeth that Percy was just being a nice guy to Reyna in order to get work done.

"Don't get me wrong, I don't necessarily hate Reyna. I just don't see eye to eye with her on a lot of stuff, or anything for that matter. So I don't really hate Reyna, but I don't really like her either. It's kind of complicated." Percy concluded, sounding more confused than when he started. Annabeth smiled silently, and nodded.

"Weirdly enough I get that. I'm just sorry I lost my cool, it's not like me." She apologized again.

"Well, why did you lose it, if you don't mind me asking." Percy asked. Annabeth thought for a second before answering.

"I really hated when she got possessive of you, like your duty was to her first. But when I found out she was ignoring my work, that's when I got really mad. I officially lost it when I saw her sitting in my chair." Annabeth was getting angry just thinking about Reyna in her chair, acting smug and haughty like she was better than her.

"I hate when she sits in your chair too." Percy agreed, sounding angry himself.

"Then why did you let her do it?" Annabeth asked, ticked that Percy would even let Reyna sit there if he didn't want her to. Then Percy did something that was completely off topic to the conversation. He started laughing. "What is so funny?" Annabeth asked, now even more ticked that Percy would even think of laughing at a time like this.

"You wanna know the truth?" Annabeth nodded, waiting for a response. "I'm genuinely scared shitless of Reyna." He confessed. At first, she wanted to be angry with him for being afraid of Reyna. The only person in the world he should be afraid of was her, and that was only because she had the power to break him emotionally as well as physically (not that she ever would). But, she could see his point; Reyna was indeed terrifying. Her facial features alone were enough to unnerve Annabeth.

"Yeah well she's not exactly the warm of fuzzy kind now is she. Well, let's just put this all behind us and move on." Annabeth concluded, looking back at the water. Silence enveloped them as they watched the last of the sun set behind the horizon. Percy was the first to break the silence, and even though his voice was low, boy did he break it.

"Even though it's completely wrong of me to think this, you're incredibly sexy when you're kicking ass. I like that side of you. I wouldn't mind seeing more of it in a less… violent setting." Percy said, but his voice was not his usual one. He had said it in a tone that was husky and deep, and Annabeth had felt it all the way through her body. Her _entire _body. She looked over at him to see him leaning back on his elbows, giving her a look that was a mix between "I love you" and "I want to make you hurt in the morning." At first she was speechless; this was not the Percy she knew. The Percy she knew was goofy, but charming because of that. This Percy sitting next to her seemed suave and cool even though he had basically just alluded to the fact that he wanted some action. Finally, her brain caught up her emotions.

"And what is your idea of a better setting?" She asked, giving him a similar look.

The events of the rest of the night were blurry to Annabeth because they happened so fast. After she had asked her question, there was making out. And then they had headed back to Percy's cabin, and then she remembered not wearing much, or anything for that matter. She also remembered having to stop it before anything happened, her paranoia setting in.

"You don't happen to have anything on you?" She had asked Percy, not wanting to come home to an angry Mr. Chase or have to face a furious Athena because she was stupid enough let herself get knocked up.

"Well uh… I mean I did but… where did I put them…" Percy answered as he rummaged through his bedside draw, but to no avail. Annabeth let out a sigh of frustration.

"I actually decided to give you some action and you're too absent minded to keep something as simple as a condom on hand?" She griped, more angry that she for her own benefit than his.

"Now hang on this isn't the end of the world. We don't have to go the whole way, I can just you know…" Percy trailed of, giving her a shrug. She shook her head.

"Huh?" She looked at him for more of an answer. Intimacy wasn't her strong point; I didn't come as naturally to her side of the family.

"Here, lie down." He instructed. At first, she had no idea what to expect, until she was introduced to another body part of his that kept him quiet for a little while. Finally, his mouth was actually getting him somewhere good. Essentially, Annabeth was in heaven. And then, she felt like she had gotten hit by a tidal wave.

"I have no idea where you learned how to do that with your tongue, but it just made up for every single dumb thing you've done since I've met you." Annabeth panted, lying back on Percy's bed. She fought the urge to pass out right there, her body completely drained after what had just occurred. She felt light headed, warm, happy, and completely amazing. For a second, Annabeth wondered if this was exactly what she had needed, and that if they had done this earlier, she wouldn't have lost her cool. Percy joined her back on the bed, returning form the porch where he had rinsed his mouth out (a demand made by Annabeth who refused to touch him again until he did so.)

"I don't know either. I kind of just, I dunno, did it." He responded, happy that he could make her happy. He wrapped his arms around her, and they stayed like that for what seemed like an eternity. Percy liked post-orgasm Annabeth. She was gentle, sweet, and slightly drowsy which made her less likely to insult him. Annabeth just liked the fact that she was even in that state, considering what led up to it. She was about to give in to the hands of sleep when she suddenly sat up.

"I can't stay, unfortunately. I have to get back to my cabin before anyone suspects anything." She said as she through her shirt and pants back on.

"Aw really? Not just this once?" Percy whined. His face was so sincere that Annabeth was almost about to stay, but knew Malcom and everyone else old enough in her cabin would give her hell.

"No, I can't let Malcom dangle something like that over my head." She responded, tying her hair back. She gave him one last kiss before heading out the door.

"Anna wait!" Annabeth turned around to see Percy holding her underwear, which she silently thanked Aphrodite that she had worn a nice pair.

"Keep it!" She yelled before making her way down the steps of his cabin. Percy stood there for a second, still shocked that he managed to pull tonight off.

"Someone got hit by the sex truck." Thalia jeered as Annabeth walked up to the porch of her cabin. Annabeth hadn't expected Thalia to be waiting for her, and this was really not the time.

"Not quite that far." Annabeth responded with a cheeky smile, in far too good a mood to be brought down.

"Ah, well at least you got hit by an on "coming" train." Thalia said, emphasizing the coming part all too obviously. "Wanna go to the bunker and watch a movie?"

"Which one?" Annabeth asked, a little too out of it to sit through a heavy-handed movie.

"Mean Girls." Thalia said with a cheesy smile and jazz hands. Annabeth had never heard of the movie; she had lived at camp at a young age and hadn't been exposed to a lot of outside influence, especially not teen comedy.

"What's it about?" Annabeth asked, half expecting an answer to be something along the lines of a horror movie or an action flick about ninja schoolgirls.

"Oh Christ woman seriously?" Thalia gave her a look of shock and humor, and then face palmed. "I've been not a tree for a little over five years and even I've seen it. It's one of the five movies every female needs to see." Thalia explained motioning Annabeth to follow.

"There are five?" Annabeth asked flatly. She wasn't even aware that there was a list.

"Yes five! Mean Girls, Titanic, Brides Maids, The Notebook, and The Breakfast Club." Thaila listed, making her way to the bunker. Annabeth followed, now immensely curious as to why a list of movies were such an important milestone in a girl's life.

"I've seen three of those. So I guess I'm on my way." Annabeth mused out loud. "Titanic, Brides Maids with Piper right before coming to camp, and The Notebook."

"Great! That's a start. Now get your butt inside!" Thalia instructed as she pointed to the bunker entrance. Annabeth stepped inside, and was greeted by the usual group, plus a few extras. Piper and Nyssa were both sitting on the couch talking about some new music, Drew was busy giving Ariadne a French braid, August was sitting on the love seat playing Angry Birds and participating in Drew and Piper's conversation, and Katie was talking to Ariadne from the couch arm rest about why Pluto doesn't need to be a planet.

"Everyone, I've located our resident bad ass." Thalia said with a bow, and gesturing towards Annabeth.

"What do I have to do to earn that title?" August asked with a smile.

"Well for one, you have to actually be cool." Piper joked. August responded with a certain middle finger, but it was all in good fun. "Alright enough chat, let's start the show." Piper said as she loaded the DVD player. Annabeth took the spinning chair next to August, who gave her a warm smile. The beginning credits started to roll, and Annabeth focused her attention on the screen.

"Whoa, Tina Fey wrote this?" Annabeth asked. She had watched a little bit of SNL on HULU before, and had always found Tina Fey to be hilarious.

"Yup. She's in it too." Nyssa commented with a mouth full of popcorn.

"_I know what you're thinking. Home-schooled kids are freaks." _Lindsey Lohan started. The rest of the movie went on from there, and it was the funniest thing Annabeth had ever seen. By the end of it, she was almost in tears. It surprised her how good the movie actually was, not just in humor, but also in the actual content. She felt for Caddy, having to deal with alpha girls herself. But, she now wished that she had a sassy gay friend. She already had an edgy alternative best friend.

"Oh man! Where do you find a gay best friend?" Ariadne asked after the movie was over, putting her shoes back on.

"I dunno. Try checking Iris's cabin?" August suggested, causing Ariadne to crack up again. "I'm sorry, that was mean of me." August said, stroking her hair back out of her face.

"Wait. Iris has a son named Damian doesn't she?" Katie asked, remembering.

"Oh Gods yes she does! I guess we all know who we're recruiting for a new gay BFF." Thalia said, jumping up and down and clapping.

"Hey nice wig Nyssa what's it made of?" Piper joked.

"YOUR MOM'S CHEST HAIR!" Nyssa joked back as she pulled on her hoodie and her hair back. Just as she was about to get up and leave, Annabeth received a text.

"U herd of Jenna Marbles?" It was from Will, her new keeper of up to date things.

"No. I'll check it out in the morning." Annabeth texted back, absolutely exhausted. She checked the clock; 12:15. AM. Then, another text.

"It's Saturday tomorrow. You wanna take leave and go into Manhattan?" Percy texted. Head councilors were entitled to Saturday leave if they so chose to, and Annabeth had been considering taking leave.

"Yes. I'll meet you at the big house around noon." She text back, happy to get some time off.

"Booty call?" Thalia said with a sly smile. Annabeth shot her a look.

"No. We are going to NYC tomorrow though. You and Nico should join us." Annabeth said with a smile.

"Why do you always tag his name to mine? I can't date remember? Not to mention I wouldn't be dating him even if I could." Thalia argued back as the two walked out of the bunker and back towards the cabins.

"No, you can't date without getting kicked out of the hunters." Annabeth reminded her.

"Or getting turned into a deer or something." Thalia grumbled.

"You know, now that the prophecies have been fulfilled, you don't have to be a hunter anymore." Annabeth said. She had honestly hoped that Thalia would quit and become a normal camper with her. "And besides, when is the last time Artemis has ever turned a hunter into a deer?" Annabeth asked rhetorically. Artemis was not known to do that to hunters. She just discharged them wherever she felt like it and left.

"I don't know, maybe she never has. But I like being a hunter! I'm like, in command you know." Thalia reminded her, looking at Annabeth and pointing to the permanent silver halo around her head.

"Yes yes I know. Are you coming with us or not?" Annabeth asked impatiently now that they had reached the cabins.

"Fine, I'll go with you to NYC. Nico can come on his own accord, but I'm not asking him." Thalia finalized. Annabeth smiled and nodded.

"Good, see you at the big house at noon." She said as she made her way into her cabin. Tomorrow would be a long day.

* * *

><p><em>I'M BAAAAACK! Wow this was a loooooong break, but it was totally worth it. Now that I have more free time to write, I've gotten so many chapters down for both stories, and a sequel in the works for P&amp;TG, and another story that's not in the Olympian universe! It's going to be awesome! So, the new schedule goes like this; Punk and the Godfather gets updated Mondays and Thursdays, and this story gets updated Tuesdays and Fridays. This chapter also ties up the Reyna arc, but I've got another arc planned. So, more awesome stuff to come all around! Stay tuned!<em>


	13. Chapter 12

**Chapter 12: Annabeth and Friends Plank their Way Around NYC and Meet some Puppets **

Morning came early, but not to a headache thankfully. The weather was over cast, making Annabeth a little irked; she had hoped for a nice sunny day to spend with her friends. Annabeth got up, picked out some nicer summer clothes consisting of a green summer dress and grey leggings, did her hair and make up, and walked to the big house. Thalia was waiting for her wearing a black polo with a Gryffindor tie and red plaid skinny jeans with a studded belt, her eyes coated in dark eyeliner and her lips equally red as her pants.

"Don't you look so proper and pristine." Thalia teased from the porch. Annabeth walked up the steps and stood next to her, waiting for the other guests to arrive.

"Gotta look good for the city I suppose." She responded. "I see you've pulled out all the stops." Annabeth remarked, looking at her rock star studded friend.

"That I did. Like a boss." Thalia said with a laugh.

"And now I think I'm officially seeing things." A voice said from the side of the house. Annabeth turned to see Nico in disbelief. Nico never needed to dress any different to go anywhere, as his dress code always remained the same. He had donned a short sleeve black button up shirt, torn black jeans, his usual chain belt and combat boots, but had also put a black fatigue hat on over his shaggy black hair. "I never thought I'd ever see you wearing a dress."

"Well you've never really seen me outside of camp." Annabeth said, shrugging.

"This isn't necessarily true, I've just never seen you in a dress." He responded, stepping on to the porch and taking a seat in one of the rocking chairs.

"So, Percy told you to come?" Annabeth asked, assuming that Thalia had kept true to her words.

"No, actually she did." Nico said, pointing at Thalia. Annabeth turned to face Thalia, giving her now bright red friend a cocked eyebrow and a sly smile.

"Oh did she?" Annabeth teased.

"He was sitting on top of his cabin on my way back to my own last night, and he said hi first. The opportunity presented itself." Thalia defended. Annabeth rolled her eyes.

"Does this combo of shirts make me look like a hipster?" Percy's voice asked from behind her. Annabeth turned to see Percy, looking very hansom in his v-neck cut grey t-shirt with a sea blue short sleeve over it left unbuttoned. His blue jeans and Chuck Taylors pulled the look together.

"No, you need a handle bar mustache and a beard to pull that off." Annabeth joked, giving him a hug.

"Jesus, call me for the wedding." Nico deadpanned.

"You're just jealous because Percy gets more tail than you." Thalia sing songed. It was Annabeth's turn to be bright red as she snapped away from Percy to give her friend a mortified look. "Oh what? You guys can all make jokes about the hunters all being lez for each other, but I can't joke about normal people's relationships? Nah it's cool, double standards rock." Thalia griped with an eye roll. Nico laughed silently to himself. Thalia smiled, considering Nico's laughter a compliment.

"Ok fine. No more lesbian jokes." Percy said, sticking his hand out in truce.

"Fine, no more sex jokes." Thalia agreed, shaking it. Annabeth was still a little shocked to respond, and decided on a change of subject.

"So, is this it or are we expecting more people?" She asked, wondering who else would be joining.

"Will said he's going next week to visit his mom, Leo and Piper are still in New Rome visiting Jason and friends, Katie has college apps to fill, and I didn't ask anyone else." Percy explained. "Oh, hey Argus. Ready?" Percy asked the many-eyed man who had just appeared at the steps of the porch. Argus nodded in the direction of the van, and the group promptly got in.

The drive was not long, and Argus decided to drop them in the center of Central Square.

"Thanks for the ride Argus. We'll meet you here around ten ok?" Percy said as Argus nodded and drove off. "First off, let's get some lunch."

"I couldn't agree more. To the food stuffs!" Thalia commanded, giving a Scott Pilgrim point to the sky. They ended up a nice bistro not too far off from Central Park, where they had all gotten into a conversation over some of the newest campers, and who would be the better warrior.

"Personally, Ares' newest boy Bruce is a thug and a half. He could kill someone by growling properly." Thalia argued, talking about Ares ten year old son who looked more like an angry pit bull than a kid.

"I dunno, I think August is pretty skilled. Have you seen the way she works a dagger? It's like she's flying." Percy said, taking into consideration someone not as battle inclined.

"Well my vote is actually on Hectate's daughter, Lila. I've seen her turn glass into gold and back again. That takes skill." Annabeth said.

"Hey… hey Nico." Thalia waved a hand at him, trying to get his attention. Nico was doing his best to ignore her. "Nico, hey, hey Nico. Nico, hey." Thalia continued, and Nico's usually stoic expression was failing him, an annoyed sigh escaping his nostrils. "Nico. Niiiiiicoooo." Thalia continued, poking his shoulder.

"What!" Nico finally looked over giving Thalia an annoyed and expectant look.

"Go plank on that bench over there." Thalia pointed to a bench across the street.

"NO." Nico responded flatly.

"C'mon! Do it and I'll take a picture and put it on facebook!" Thalia begged.

"I'm not planking. Do it yourself." Nico said with another equally annoyed look on his face.

"Guh. Fine I will." Thalia said, giving him an evil stare.

"Planking?" Annabeth asked, assuming another internet fad.

"Just watch." Nico instructed as Thalia proceeded to lie face down on the bench, though still in the walking position. Nico took the iPhone and snapped a picture.

"Got it!" He yelled as Thalia quickly got back up and hopped over the bistro fence and back into her seat.

"Aw sweet gimme!" Thalia demanded as she took the phone from Nico.

"And what's the point of this?" Annabeth asked, thoroughly confused as to why this was a thing.

"The point is that there is none." Percy said. "It's just so people look and go what the hell."

"That's incredibly stupid." Annabeth deadpanned. She had no idea why anyone would want to lie face down on strange surfaces all for facebook photos.

"Your face is incredibly stupid." Thalia shot back.

"Your mom is incredibly stupid." Annabeth replied, taking a sip of her sweet tea.

"Can't argue there. Where to next?" Thalia asked, impatient to keep moving. She and Percy were alike in more ways than one, but one of the most prominent ways was their inability to stay still.

"Let's go to Central Park." Nico suggested, standing up and stretching.

"Ugh. I go there like, all the time and stuff." Percy complained as they stood up and continued their walk.

"Too bad, decision made. You lost." Thalia said, linking arms with Annabeth and Nico. Annabeth linked her arms through Percy's, completing the chain.

"Hey look! It's like the Wizard of Oz. I'm the Tin Man, Percy's the Scare Crow, Nico is the Cowardly Lion, and Annabeth is Dorothy!" Thalia pointed out.

"Wait, wait! Why am I the cowardly lion?" Nico asked, unhooking his arm and walking a few feet in front of the chain.

"Because I'm the Tin Man because of my ability to not die, and Percy's height and lack of brain power makes him the Scarecrow." Thalia explained, reaching out for him to link his arm to hers.

"Hey wait, that's not funny!" Percy whined.

"Yes it is seaweed brain, now hush." Annabeth said, leaning against him.

"I dare you to go plank on the bridge rail." Nico said, looking at the stone bridge that spanned over the walkway they were on. The rail was just big enough to hold a person planking.

"No, I've already planked. You do it." Thalia said, unhooking her arm from Annabeth's and stepping next to Nico.

"What's wrong? Scared that it's too high up?" Nico asked with an evil smile. Annabeth looked at Percy as if to ask how he knew that. Percy shrugged. Thalia turned to Nico, now angry.

"Fuck you." Thalia spat, now pissed off at Nico. "I'm just trying to be friendly, and you drag that shit into this." Nico looked a little guilty as Thalia fell back next to Annabeth.

"Fine. I'll plank on the damn bridge." Nico said, using his somewhat overpowered Demi strength to jump and grab a hold of the side and pull himself up. The bridge was low enough to where any passerby's could have easily mistaken him for just a really good jumper. Thalia pulled out her camera as Nico quickly laid face down and took a shot.

"Done!" She said, and Nico quickly slid off of the railing and landed on his feet like a cat. "That wasn't so hard now was it?" Thalia asked, giving him a cocky smile.

"Whatever. Now we're even." Nico said with an eye roll. Annabeth had stopped paying attention to the planking debacle, however.

"Avenue Q." Annabeth read out loud off of a sign in the park. The Q was covered by a fuzzy circle of orange, catchy her eye.

"That's the funniest show ever." Nico said in a low voice, smiling to himself.

"You've seen it?" Percy asked.

"Snuck in once last year on one of my many travel adventures. Still playing off Broadway. I bet if we hurry we can still get tickets." Nico mentioned, continuing to walk down the path.

"Sure, why not. It's not like there's anything to do around here." Annabeth agreed.

The group caught a cab to the theater and made their way to the ticket booth. The line was relatively small, but they still had to wait a little while before they got to the counter.

"Four for the three thirty show." Annabeth said as she slid her card across the counter.

"You have a card?" Percy asked.

"May dad thinks it's cool to win my affection with material wealth." Annabeth explained. "Not that I can complain. I've already gotten an iPhone and a new pair of Uggs out of it."

"Well it says here Miss Chase that you already have four tickets waiting for you." The man at the booth said. "I just need some ID to confirm your identity."

"Really? I never purchased any before hand." Annabeth said, confused as to who purchased them in her name. She slid her ID over the counter.

"They're apparently a gift from you're uncle, Mr. Teras. He called to say you'd be by later today to pick them up before the show." The ticket man explained.

"Oh, ok thank you. I'll be sure to tell him thanks." Annabeth took the tickets, and the group proceeded to the entrance of the theatre. _Teras. _Annabeth though to herself. _Greek for Amazing. My uncle, Mister Amazing, who knew we were coming to this show before we did, bought us tickets. My amazing uncle who predicts the future and likes musicals. That only leads to Apollo."_

"So who's this mister Amazing?" Percy asked, thinking much the same thoughts as everyone else.

"My uncle who likes musicals and predicts the future. It's Apollo telling us to keep our mouth shut about his Xbox habits." Annabeth said, smiling to herself.

"Ah. Well then running into him wasn't such a bad thing after all." Nico said as they made their way inside.

"Apollo plays Xbox?" Thalia asked, now fascinated.

"Oh you have no idea." Annabeth responded, walking down the isle to their seats.

The show was unlike anything Annabeth had ever witnessed. It was Sesame Street, but on crack. Annabeth's childhood before camp was blurry to say the least, but she did have fuzzy memories of watching Sesame Street and being completely enthralled in it as a toddler. This Broadway show had taken those memories and injected it with enough inappropriate behavior to possibly kill a nun. Between a song about loud sex, another about life sucking but living with it, and yet another about the internet being for porn (in which Annabeth had elbowed Percy during), no one in the group could keep a strait face. It was raunchy, it was childhood killing, and it was hilarious. The day was going dark as the group stepped out of the theatre, though it was only around five.

"See, I told you so!" Nico boasted proudly.

"When you're right, you're right." Annabeth agreed, wrapping herself around Percy's arm.

"Is it legal to name a child Christmas Eve? Because I'm totally convincing someone to do that." Thalia said, still giggling. Annabeth was sure the group would have several quotes flying around amongst them as new inside jokes in the next few days. As they continued to walk down the street and quote puppets, Percy checked his watch.

"Still got another four hours left. What next?" Percy asked, always wanting to do something new.

"I have an idea." Annabeth said with a smile.

"Wow. She really doesn't look like Athena." Nico commented as they looked up at the huge, looming Statue of Liberty, having caught a fairy over from the mainland. The lighting for the night made the entire statue seem much more ominous and threatening than the statue seemed from far away.

"True. But then again, Frédéric Bartholdi wasn't trying to be exact. Liberty was only based on Athena, not designed verbatim." Annabeth explained, having studied every last part of the statue in her reading.

"Let's go to the top and look out." Percy suggested. Annabeth nodded in agreement, and began to follow him to the entrance of the stairs.

"You guys go ahead. I'll stay down here." Thalia said, turning pale at the thought of going up so high.

"Sure thing, see you in a few. You coming, Nico?" Percy asked as he continued to walk.

"Nah, I'm cool. I've already been to the top. I'll just stay down here with Thunder Girl." Nico said. Percy shrugged, and he and Annabeth started to make their way up the steps. The statue was relatively deserted, save for a security guard or two. The weather had become more and more threatening on their way to the statue, making the landmark and unfavorable destination at the moment. Annabeth was actually not so unhappy about that fact.

"Used to be you could actually go into the torch, but the wind is a bit much out here so they closed that section." Percy explained as he and Annabeth looked out onto the horizon.

"The view is equally nice from here though. And besides, anywhere I'm with you is just fine." Annabeth commented, leaning in to kiss him. Percy, however, pulled away before she could.

"If I kiss you in a huge statue of your mother, I'm afraid I may get struck by lightning." He said, looking almost panicked. Thunder rolled in the background, confirming his fears.

"Fine _mother_ I get the hint!" Annabeth griped upwardly. The thunder stopped, as if on command. "Let's head down. It's going to rain any second now anyways." She said as the wind began to whip faster.

"That's not a bad idea actually." Percy agreed, making his way back down the steps. Once at the bottom, Annabeth's predictions were correct. The rain began to fall, but it wasn't a hard rain thankfully. The drizzle was harmless, but it would soon progress.

"Let's head home early. It's only about seven, but I think we'll get caught in the storm if we don't." Annabeth suggested. Percy nodded.

"Ok, but where are the other two?" He asked, looking for Thalia and Nico.

"Err… right here." Nico said, appearing from behind the statue and looking oddly sheepish.

"I'm uh, here too." Thalia appeared behind him, also looking equally flustered.

"Let's head home early, OK?" Annabeth directed the group towards the fairy, and they quickly got on to head back to main land.

"You've got to see it Malcolm! You'd love it. It's actually very charming." Annabeth explained Avenue Q to her brother as she slumped down on her bed after having changed out of her clothes and into PJs for the evening. The rain had indeed turned into a pretty torrential down poor, making Annabeth thankful that they had returned home early.

"Yes well I fail to see how puppetry can convey deep morals." Malcolm responded, not interested. Annabeth had a hunch that Malcolm harbored a fear of puppets, but said nothing. Suddenly, her phone went off.

"Why is Thalia texting me so soon?" Annabeth wondered out loud. She opened the text.

"I need to talk. Get over heer NOW."

* * *

><p><em>Updating this at 1AM because I have no class tomorrow and my insomnia is making me not want to sleep ever again ever. So, this next arc is my take on Thalico. It's not going to be as prominent as the Reyna arc, but I think it's still pretty cool. I've got some things planned for Annabeth and CO that may or may not include someone trying to make a vlog. Also, there will be a tie in fairly soon with my other fan fic, but it won't really change anything in this fic. I had planned it all along, so I'm hoping it will make sense. Anyways, ENJOY!<em>


	14. Chapter 13

**Chapter 13: Annabeth Fucks Up**

"So tell me exactly what's going on." Annabeth instructed Thalia as the two stood inside Zeus's cabin. It was the only place Thalia knew they could talk and not be disturbed.

"I don't really know exactly. Nico and I have always been kind of on ok terms, but I never really knew the guy until last summer when everyone teamed up in Greece. But then I started to see him more often because he and Artemis are on good terms because she is understanding about his sister so he likes to check up on us every now and then, and he kept getting more and more attractive as he started to grow up, and I didn't age because of the whole hunters thing…" Thalia took a breath and chewed on her nail. "I just don't know what to think anymore." She whined, slumping down against the wall.

"So you like him then?" Annabeth responded, leaning up next to her against the wall. Annabeth knew she was not the person to go to with emotional issues. She had enough of a time with her own relationship; it took up to four and a half years to finally solidify and they still have communication issues and lovers spats that often ended in Percy lying on his back on the floor. Athena's kids were not known for their emotional incites.

"I don't know! That's just it!" Thalia whined. "It all started the other day when I was watching the sunset on top of the hill, and he came to do the same because apparently that's what he does. And then we started talking about stuff, and he told me about his mother, and I told him about mine, and we bonded over shitty parenting. And then I started to notice that he looks like a young Billie Joe." Thalia explained, still chewing on her nail.

"Who?" Now Annabeth was more curious about the culture reference.

"Billie Joe? From Green Day?" Thalia said, looking at Annabeth sideways. Annabeth nodded, knowing of Green Day from both Thalia and August's obsession with the band. "Anyways, he's pretty much my type, but I can't give up the hunters."

"Why not?" Annabeth was confused as to why Thalia couldn't. Artemis would be pissed sure, but Artemis wouldn't kill her for leaving.

"Let's count the reasons shall we. One, I'm technically second in command. Two, you don't know that Artemis won't turn me into a deer and hunt my ass down for this. Three, this isn't some deep emotional connection like you and Percy have. In fact, I have no idea what this is." Thalia finished, looking even more distraught.

"I hate to sound uncaring, but why did you come to me with this?" Annabeth asked, greatly unsure of what to do.

"Because you're my best friend and I know I can trust you not to tell anyone." Thalia responded. "Anyways, I was just going to drop this whole thing and leave it at finding him attractive, but then he asked me out at the statue." Annabeth's jaw dropped.

"Hang on, he did?" Annabeth was shocked. She had never known Nico to be the romantic type.

"Well kind of. He asked if I would be interested in going to see a movie next weekend, but just the two of us." Thalia looked even more distraught than when she had started. Annabeth had no idea how to respond to any of it.

"Ok, here's what I'm thinking we need to do. I think we both should sleep on it, and then discuss this in the morning when we're not crying tired." Annabeth suggested, needed time to think everything through.

"That's actually not a bad idea. I'll see you in the morning then." Thalia said in a run down voice as she got up.

"Alright. Try and get some sleep." Annabeth said as she too went back to her cabin. So much for a thought free evening.

"Ouch! August!" Ariadne whined as August twisted her arm behind her back and knocked her knees out from under her. Annabeth had agreed to let August help out in Athena's cabin with Sunday chores, but August was hardly working at the moment. The one thing that would surprise most people about Apollo and Athena's cabins is there cleanliness. Most people would assume that Apollo's cabin was a cluttered mess while Athena's was organized and pristine, but it was in fact the opposite. Athena's cabin was always cluttered with books, scrolls, crafts, pencils and pens, as well as the various assorted weapons that were strewn around. Campers rarely had to time to clean when they were busy in their studies. Apollo's cabin, however, was always kept strait and orderly. Will liked to keep it that way to avoid medical mix ups with supplies and to keep everyone's poetry and sheet music in order. August had finished organizing early, and had taken the opportunity to help out around Athena's cabin. However, the helping had quickly turned into a friendly, albeit fierce, wrestling match between Annabeth's sister, Ariadne, and August.

"August! I let you in to help clean, not to break my sister." Annabeth chided, putting the encyclopedias in order on the shelf.

"She started it." August griped, letting Ariadne out of her arm hold. "Ooooh what's this?" She asked as her ADHD got the better of her causing her to pick up an old book from the strategy table.

"It's a book on ancient Greek battle strategy." Ariadne explained as August thumbed through it.

"Any characters?" She asked.

"No." Annabeth said.

"Humor?"

"Again, no." Annabeth said, picking up another book and placing it on the shelf.

"Romance?"

"None of that either." Ariadne responded.

"Anything I could write fanfiction about?"

"Knowing you, I bet you could. But, no." Ariadne responded, taking the book from August and putting it on the shelf.

"What now?" Annabeth asked, having no idea what the term Fan Fiction even meant.

"Fan fiction. When you right a story based on the characters and slash or universe of an already establish work of fiction." August defined, sounding very official in her definition.

"That sounds… interesting." Annabeth commented, still trying to put all the encyclopedias in order.

"Well it is if it's good. It's hard to find a decent story amongst the slum of fanfiction dot net." August continued, now back to cleaning.

"There's a website dedicated to it?" Annabeth was now curious.

"Oh no Annabeth. There are thousands of websites dedicated to fan fiction. That one just happens to be one of the better known sources." August said as she balled up an old calculation sheet and took a shot at the trashcan, making it in. "Baller." She said under her breath, pumping her fist inward.

"Do you write fan fiction, August?" Ariadne asked, helping Annabeth put the shelf back together. August stopped cleaning and turned pink.

"Maybe…" She answered, picking up a wilted hoodie and throwing it in the dirty clothes hamper.

"About what?" Ariadne prodded.

"Rrrsh Mms." August mumbled, going back to cleaning.

"What now?"

"Ger rams." August spoke up, still not trying to be clear.

"August seriously. It's not that embarrassing." Ariadne said, giving August a sly smile.

"Hunger. Games." August shot out. "And don't say anything."

"Oh gods the Hunger Games is the coolest thing ever." Ariadne agreed, reaching out to August for a high five, which August took with glee.

"I know. I've read them too!" Annabeth agreed, happy that someone else had read them. Percy was only on the first book still, and Thalia didn't have a whole lot of time for reading while traveling.

"So you write fanfics about it?" Ariadne asked, looking at August with an amused look. August turned pink again.

"Well not all the time. I mean, I do a better job than most writers out there." August defended. "Look me up. My pen name is HotShot08."

"Ok then, I will." Annabeth said as she made her way through the pile of scrolls on the table.

"Well I must be off. My laundry is probably ready by now, and if I don't take it out now Connor and Travis are going to steal my bras again." August explained as she sauntered out of the cabin. Ariadne snorted and giggled at that, but Annabeth rolled her eyes having been a victim of the Stoll Brother's laundry thievery before.

"I think we're clean enough for now." Annabeth said as she looked around the newly organized cabin. "You want to go rock climbing?" Annabeth asked her sister, hoping to stall so she wouldn't have to face Thalia right away.

"Can't. I have lunch duty." Ariadne said with an eye roll.

"Ah, I see. Well then I guess I better face the music." Annabeth grumbled as she walked out the door.

"Face what music?" Ariadne asked after her.

"Nothing. Don't worry about and go shuck some corn." Annabeth called back, making her way towards Zeus's cabin.

"So you haven't decided then?" Annabeth asked after Thalia told her she hadn't come up with a decision.

"No, I haven't." Thalia said as she hang her head down between her legs. Zeus's cabin was huge and cold; not the cluttered yet warm atmosphere of Annabeth's own cabin. Annabeth wondered why no one had bothered to leave the cabin furnished, given that the pact between the big three hadn't exactly stayed in place. Even Percy's beach bungalow was more of a home than the almost empty cabin space that was Zeus's domain. "I don't know what to do anymore. I'm thinking of taking some time off alone to go do some solo hunting. I never managed to catch the Golden Deer you know."

"You can't run away from your problems. Trust me, I tried to do that myself." Annabeth said, thinking Thalia's idea flawed. Annabeth had come to terms with her father and step mother several years back, and had now taken to living with them on breaks and during free time away from camp and boarding school. She knew that Thalia running away from problems would only result in more hurt feelings and confusion than solving anything.

"Correction. We did to do that, and it worked." Thalia corrected.

"No, it didn't." Annabeth argued back.

"What do you mean it didn't? We turned out ok." Thalia stood up and shook her head, looking disappointed that her best friend was not on her side with this.

"No, we didn't. You have no idea how long it took me to get over my abandonment issues with my father, and I can damn well tell you that you're still not over how your relationship with your mother ended." Annabeth corrected, now standing up to meet Thalia's eye.

"I could care less about my mother, and you're doing ok now so what does it matter? Running away isn't always a bad thing Annabeth. Sometimes it's good to get away from your problems." Thalia argued, trying to assert her point.

"Ok sure, tell that to Luke next time you see him." Annabeth shot back, and instantly regretted it. "I… oh gods I can't believe I said that." She whispered under her breath. Thalia looked equally as stunned, and was now furious.

"You know what Annabeth?" Thalia said with angry tears in her eyes. "Fuck you! I at least expected my best friend to understand!" She yelled, fed up.

"That came out wrong, I swear! I didn't mean it like that, I just meant that you should probably try and talk it out with Nico instead of running." Annabeth hastily explained.

"You don't know my life or what I'm feeling! Stop trying to tell me what I should and shouldn't do!" Thalia shot back.

"Hey, you came to me, remember?" Annabeth reminded her.

"I don't fucking care anymore. I'll be back in a few days. Don't come looking for me." Thalia growled as she ran out of the cabin.

"Thalia! Tally wait!" Annabeth called after her, but Thalia was already running up the hill away from Half-Blood.

_Bang, bang, bang, bang, bang _

"Anna, you're going to give yourself a bruise." Percy said as he rubbed her shoulders, trying to comfort her. Annabeth had barely made it inside his cabin before emotionally word vomiting all over him, and now she had taken banging her head against the doorframe of his room.

"I'm literally the most emotionally retarded person on the planet." She whined, feeling awful.

"No you did the right thing, you just said the wrong thing." Percy corrected, hugging her around the waist.

"I don't know why I said that. I guess I just knew it would get to her." Annabeth continued.

"Exactly! It's kind of like the time I accidentally brought up Travis's cup size when I was arguing with him over Pokémon. Not my proudest moment." Percy said, trying to be helpful.

"Now that's really dumb." Annabeth grumbled. But, even Percy's stupidity couldn't pull her out of her slump.

"Ok, I'll tell you what. Let's just drop the whole thing for a second, and go look at stupid videos on the internet. Sounds good?" Percy suggested, running out of good ideas to pull his emotional girlfriend who happened to be scary when angry out of her emotional haze.

"Alright fine. It's not like I can change anything now." Annabeth complained, but she didn't argue.

"Where should we start?" Percy asked, flopping down on his bed and opening up his computer. Annabeth flopped down next to him, and looked over his shoulder at the screen.

* * *

><p><em>Poor Annabeth. I know how you feel, kinda. Anyways, this chapter wasn't really funny sorry to say. But the next chapter will be, and the chapter after that will be too. So you'll just have to suffer through an emotional chapter right now because I told you to. Also, Half-Blood should have Hunger Games. Just sayin'. <em>


	15. Chapter 14

**Chapter 14: Annabeth Discovers the Blogging Side of YouTube and Grand Theft Auto**

"Ok so that's Jenna J-e-n-n-a, and Marbles, M-a-r-b-l-e-s. And click." Annabeth mumbled to herself as she typed the name out in the YouTube search. "Ah, here we are."

"So Will told you about this?" Percy asked, unsure of what Will had been telling people to view on YouTube. Ever since Will had told him about The Human Centipede, Percy had learned to steer clear of anything Will had to say without a second opinion on the matter.

"Yup, like most other stuff I've found on the net as of recent. Oh, here we are." Annabeth clicked on a link leading to a YouTube profile of a twenty something age woman with blonde hair, and a somewhat odd obsession with her dogs and weird face make up.

"Oh! Click that one!" Percy directed, pointing a finger at the video labled "Deep Thoughts with Ke$ha."

"Well it's not like I can get any stupider today." Annabeth griped, still unhappy at her current friendship status.

"_SUP BITCHES!" _Jenna said as she ripped her way from a trash bag in full on Ke$ha eye makeup and glitter.

"Did she seriously just emerge from a trash bag?" Annabeth questioned as Jenna continued to talk about dating strange men and the status of her pubic hair.

"This is the funniest thing I've ever seen." Percy remarked through his own laughter. "Do the one about Christmas Crafts with Madonna!"

"I must say, she is rather brilliant. But, something tells me I've seen her before." Annabeth said more to herself than anyone as she clicked on the next video.

"_Sometimes I talk with a British accent. It's probably because I'm rich." _Jenna had now donned fake muscle padding, a Madonna wig, a bikini top, and a Santa hat and was now attempting horrible holiday art. Though Annabeth found it funny, something was still bugging her about Jenna. She looked very familiar.

"So you've seen her before somewhere?" Percy asked, recovering from a second fit of giggles.

"I know I have. She's just… way too familiar." Annabeth was sure she knew Jenna from somewhere, but still couldn't place her where.

"Oh Gods now she's doing street magic." Percy said, snapping Annabeth's attention back to the screen. They went through several videos, cracking up all the while, but that feeling Annabeth knew her from somewhere was still clunking around in the back of her head.

"Hang on, I know that smile." Annabeth was so close to the answer. "I've seen it on Mr… oh Gods I remember her now!" Annabeth exclaimed as she jumped out of Percy's lap and off the bed, pacing.

"You do? From where?" Percy asked, surprised that Annabeth would have any sort of associations with someone seven years older than her and out of college.

"Yes! She was a camper way before you ever came around. Her father is Dionysus." Annabeth explained. "Though she took after more of his comedic theatrical side. Did I ever tell you that Dionysus was the main driving force behind the creation of Greek theatre?" Annabeth asked, greeted by a headshake from Percy. "Well he was, and he was also known for creating what was essentially mass orgies of drunken parties. Jenna was actually very smart when I knew her, but honestly she left when I was ten, so I don't remember her really well."

"Wait, so she's an alumni?" Percy asked, seeming more interested with Annabeth's retelling then with the computer.

"Apparently. Though, I haven't seen her since she left for college." Annabeth said, sitting back in Percy's lap.

"Who can blame her? She got out before shit hit the fan." He said, looking at the recommended video pages. "Who is this Shane Dawson?"

"Who?" Annabeth looked at the side bar, and indeed his videos littered the suggestion page.

"Him. Click the one about this ShaNayNay character." Percy pointed at Shane Dawson in a dorag and awkward face makeup.

"Huh, that's actually really funny." Annabeth mused.

"What are you thinking, Wise Girl?" Percy asked, knowing Annabeth's tone of voice all to well.

"They do this in their own homes, with hand held cameras. What makes it funny is that they themselves are funny." Annabeth explained, sitting on the side of the bed and looking out the window at the lake.

"Yeah, I guess that is true." Percy said, not really knowing where she was going with this.

"I'm smart." Annabeth said like it had just hit her.

"Well duh." Percy responded, still questioning her motifs.

"And you're funny." She said, turning towards him again.

"You think so?" Percy puffed up at the compliment.

"We have iPhones." Annabeth continued.

"That we do." Percy was starting to catch on.

"And some pretty nutty friends. We could do stuff like this you know." Annabeth concluded, standing up and crossing her arms, looking down at Percy.

"You're right. But where to start?" Percy asked, turning over on his back and looking up at her upside down.

"Good question. And we wouldn't be able to do it at camp." Annabeth mentioned, pacing again.

"Why not?" Percy asked, now wanting his own vlog.

"Think Seaweed Brain!" Annabeth chided, snapping her fingers in his face. "What would happen if people were to see Half-Blood first hand?" She asked him, looking at him like he was crazy. "Mass panic because of the facts that people will see us wielding deadly weapons, the fact that we're essentially cult worshipers, giant dogs and flaming arrows, not to mention the fact that I don't think people will be willing to accept the fact that you're wielding water like an extension of your arm or that Leo has caused a camp fire to start with his hands."

"Oh yeah… good point." Percy agreed, thinking it through. "So, where would we do this then?"

"I don't know. Where would we do this?" Annabeth asked herself more than anyone. _KNOCK KNOCK KNOCK. _"Who on earth is that?" She asked Percy, who shrugged as the knocks turned into strait up banging. _BANG BANG BANG BANG. _

"This is an informal invite to insanity! You in?" Leo's voice called through the door.

"So what exactly am I looking at?" Annabeth asked, watching Leo boot up the bunker's PS3.

"Grand Theft Auto; San Andreas." Leo responded.

"And what's the goal of this game again?" She asked.

"Well the original story line is to restore your neighborhood to its former glory. However, I usually just play it to beat people up with a cane and light hookers on fire." Leo said with an evil laugh.

"Ok so it's essentially Compton the game then?" Annabeth said, rolling her eyes. "And this is fun because?"

"Because you can do whatever you want to do." Percy responded, pressing start and watching as the game started out in a run down cul de sac with a muscular gangster looking man standing at the entrance to a house. "And right now, I'm going to fly a jet pack to the country side and find the two player chip so you can help me blow stuff up."

"I never agreed to this." Annabeth complained, not happy about the fact that she had to forfeit a perfectly good afternoon of Internet stupidity for violent stupidity. "Where did that jet pack come from?"

"The magical land of cheat codes." Leo said, moving his fingers over the keyboard of his computer, obviously looking up more cheats for Percy to abuse.

"Did you just shoot a hooker from the sky?" Annabeth asked, watching in horror, and yet stunned amusement as Percy proceeded to play Angel of Death to all of the unsuspecting victims below via jet pack view.

"That I did, Wise Girl. That I did." Percy responded, proceeding to land in a weird outsourced town with rednecks running around everywhere.

"Ok, so what are you really supposed to be doing here?" Annabeth asked, still not convinced that this is all the game play held.

"Essentially you're in the middle of a gang war, and you're supposed to go on missions to help out your family gang." Leo explained, still looking up cheat codes.

"Hang on, let me play." Annabeth demanded, reaching for Percy's controller.

"Wait no! I'm just about to…" Percy protested, but Annabeth was too fast for him as she swiftly snatched the controller out of his hands.

"Ok so to shoot is… let's see here, Ah! The O button. And… ok we switch weapons with R one and L one, and we jump, and… oh look I just stole a car!" Annabeth said more to herself than anything as she figured out her surroundings.

"Ok now be careful not to hit pedestrians… well never mind that then." Percy tried to give direction, but Annabeth wasn't listening as she plowed down a sidewalk of people.

"What does the blinking star thing mean?" Annabeth asked, looking at the top of her screen where a yellow star had emerged and was blinking condescendingly.

"It means you have police on your tail. The more stars you get, the more police you'll have chasing you." Leo explained, smiling at Annabeth's disregard for humanity.

"Ah, I see. Well I better stop driving down the sidewalk then." She remarked, steering back onto the road, albeit on the wrong side. "Oh damn, just hit an oncoming car. You know, realistically I should have crashed through the windshield to my death."

"That's why this game is so awesome though! You get to wreak havoc and yet you're somewhat invincible." Percy said, watching Annabeth's avatar now walking down the street, flamethrower in hand and flaming hookers abound.

"This game is pretty unethical." She remarked, though disregarding her own statement as she continued a mass fire cleansing of everyone around her.

"Uh Anna… You've got another star from burning your way through the neighborhood." Percy pointed out.

"Damn. Alright how do I get rid of them?" She asked, watching a police car haphazardly swerve through a group of people to get to her.

"You run!" Leo directed, poking her shoulder to get her to start moving.

"Oh! Ok let me see the cheat codes." She demanded, pausing the game and taking a look at the computer in front of Leo. "What on earth is that?" She asked, pointing at a cheat to spawn a certain vehicle.

"That's a fighter copter." Leo explained.

"That'll work." She said, unpausing the game and typing in the cheat as fast as she could. Right in front of her, a huge fighter copter, missiles and all, spawned in front of her, crushing a police car in the process. "Alrighty, time to make my great escape." She said, hopping into the helicopter and taking flight.

"It has missiles to you know." Leo pointed out, pressing the O button and taking down a police car below.

"Why don't I own one of these in real life?" Annabeth asked to herself, targeting another police car, sending it sky high.

"For this exact reason." Percy stated, enjoying Annabeth's tirade against San Andreas. Suddenly, his phone rang. "I have to take this, hang on."

"Ok cool, I'll be here." Annabeth said back, not really paying attention as she continued to fly around and bombard the police. After a few minutes, Percy stormed back in, looking rather pale.

"Thalia's lost, and surrounded by hell hounds. We have to go, NOW."

* * *

><p><em>Sorry for the delay, I went to see the Hunger Games last Friday and didn't update. Then I didn't like the chapters I had written. And then came self debate... ugh. Anyways, this week is spring break, so updates will resume next week! <em>


	16. Chapter 15

**Chapter 15: Annabeth's Viral Video Attempts Render Interesting Results **

"_Oh shit oh shit oh gods damn damn damn shit fuck damn oh gods_…" Annabeth chanted under her breath, darting through the woods and trees towards the source of the call. She thanked the Gods that Leo could trace the call to a certain location, but she cursed herself for causing all of this. She'd be lucky if Thalia hadn't suffered any injuries, but something told her that Thalia wouldn't have called if this wasn't serious.

"Anna… wait up… you're going… too… fast!" Percy begged from a good three yards behind her. Percy's stamina, strength, and skill rivaled anyone's on the planet… until you mess with Annabeth or her friends. Then it becomes all but impossible to keep up with her. He knew she wouldn't slow down for him or anybody at this point, and the constant out of character stream of curse words coming from her mouth let him know that she wasn't in the mood to baby anyone or put up with bullshit or breaks on this mission.

"Annabeth! Wait up!" Another voice called, causing Annabeth to pause for a second. From the wooded trees behind them, Nico appeared ahead of Percy, stopping short of Annabeth. "I want to help. I mean, I can't help but think this is a little bit my fault." He said, looking guilty and embarrassed.

Annabeth shook her head empathetically. "No, it's not. But, come on and join us regardless. You came so far anyways, might as well enjoy the fight." Annabeth said, turning back towards her destination and taking off again.

"Anna? Wait! Wait a minute don't just take off!" Percy called after the duo, running behind their path.

Annabeth heard everything before she saw the scene; growling, screaming, grunting, battle cries, and howling. Thankfully, Thalia hadn't gone too far out of campgrounds, but far enough to where the screaming and fighting wouldn't be heard for miles. "Thalia! THALIA!" Annabeth screamed, unsheathing her knife and charging head on to battle with any form of monster, disregarding any and all forms of rational thought and strategy. Instantly, she was greeted by a hoard of hellhounds and a very out numbered Thalia.

"DUCK!" Thalia called out right as Annabeth narrowly avoided a hellhound, jabbing up to stab and slice it through the stomach. The beast burst into dust just before it hit the ground, and Annabeth saw to her left Percy take down another one with a quick swipe of his sword.

"How are there so many?" Nico asked, jumping above a hound and coming down through the head with his sword, effectively killing the monster.

"How did you find me is the real question!" Thalia called back, ducking to avoid another hound that had jumped to attack, shooting it through the temple with a silver arrow.

"Leo traced the call!" Annabeth responded, moving out of the way of another large hound, only to have it lunge at Percy. Thankfully, he turned and swiped just as it was about to hit him.

"I called for Percy, not you!" Thalia called back, still sounding angry.

Annabeth used a tree to volt her way towards the last hell hound and slice the throat before she responded. "Well too bad, because here I am." She responded, out of breath. "And here's Nico." She gestured towards Nico, who was also out of breath and dusting his pants off. "You two should talk." Annabeth said, turning to walk away, tired of fighting both monsters and her friends.

"You're just going to walk away then?" Thalia said, sounding more hurt than angry.

"Well you haven't exactly given me a warm welcome when I came running to save your life." Annabeth responded, not turning around or slowing down.

"I guess I didn't…" Thalia responded, trailing off.

"Well when you're ready to talk, I'll be back at camp. Nico can escort you back. You're welcome for the life saver by the way." Annabeth said over her shoulder, not wanting to fight anyone anymore.

Suddenly, Thalia barreled into her. "I'm sorry!" She whined into Annabeth's shoulder. "Can we talk later?" She asked, turning Annabeth around to meet her eyes, which were surprisingly wet with tears.

"Yes, of course." Annabeth answered hugging back. "Whenever you're ready."

"Ok… thanks." Thalia whispered, turning back towards Nico and the giving Annabeth a look that let her know that having time to talk to Nico alone was needed.

"Come along Perseus. We're no longer needed." Annabeth motioned for Percy to follow, which he did so obediently, not wanting to get on Thalia's or Annabeth's nerves even more.

"Well that was more than I bargained for this afternoon." He said, falling in beside Annabeth. "What do you wanna do now?" He asked, seeming a little relieved that he was no longer having to fight off monsters. Annabeth looked off into space, thinking.

"No trust me, this will be awesome!" Percy yelled from on top of his cabin, which happened to face the lake just enough to where if he got a running start off of his roof, he could potentially jump off and strait into the lake. "Get the phone ready!" He yelled, making sure Annabeth was filming the entire thing.

"This is not what I meant when I said creating a viral video!" Annabeth yelled, worried that Percy would break his neck or something similar. Normally, Percy was actually fairly smart and thought about his actions. Normally. However, Percy had a habit of breaking the norm far too often.

Percy readied himself to take off, giving Annabeth a few words of comfort. "Relax, Wise Girl. You said yourself that if I got enough speed…"

"That you would hit the lake, yeah I know." Annabeth cut him off. "But if you miss, you hit the dock. The hard wooden dock."

"That won't happen, I promise." He shouted back. "Ok ready, set go!" And Percy was off, and he did indeed get some speed and height, enough in fact to not hit the dock and allow Annabeth to get a pretty cool shot of his jump. There were two problems, however. One was that the lake had dried a considerable amount due to Chiron's lack of observance towards recent rain input, and the other was the Percy had missed his initial target just past the dock, instead landing more towards the left and more inland, causing Percy to hit mostly mud with a very audible _THWUMP. _

"Ho man Percy are you ok?" Grover, who had been quietly watching from the sidelines the whole time yelled, now panicking. Annabeth, who should have also been panicking from Percy's safety, was not panicking in the slightest. In fact, Annabeth was cracking up.

"That was… the funniest thing… EVER!" Annabeth forced out from between hysterics, running towards Percy with her iPhone still filming. As she approached Percy, he stood up caked in mud, looking more like a bad 50's horror movie monster than anything, and lumbered towards her.

"Somebody needs a hug!" He proclaimed, extending his arms out towards her.

"Percy… what are you… wait no this is not ok!" She protested, backing away as he continued towards her.

"But I love you and think you deserve a hug." He responded, making his way towards Annabeth with a little more speed.

"I never agreed to this!" She whined turning to run, only to have Grover stop her and shove her into Percy's mud caked arms. "NO! NO THIS IS NOT OK!" She squealed, thrashing about in Percy's sticky, mud caked grip.

"Shhhh… shhhh… yes it is." Percy whispered back, sounding more creepy than loving.

Finally, Annabeth forced her way out of his grip and looked down at her shirt and shorts, which were now covered in a layer of brown. "I seriously just washed these…" She said under her breath. She heard laughing, and looked over to see that Grover had been filming the entire scene, and was now backing away towards the door of the cabin.

"Grover, what are you doing?" Percy asked, but he was too late to catch on as Grover sprinted inside and locked the door.

"YOU ARE NOT ABOUT TO UPLOAD THAT!" Annabeth yelled, banging on the cabin door as she watched Grover lock the door and window, and pull out Percy's laptop. Grover just nodded with a cheeky smile and grabbed Percy's iPhone cord. "Grover! I didn't give you permission to do this!"

"And neither did I!" Percy agreed, banging on the window. Grover just giggled to himself as he proceeded to hit the upload button.

"And he calls me his best friend." Percy sighed, and turned towards Annabeth. "I have an idea!" He proclaimed, and before Annabeth could react, he had picked her up bridal style and walked towards the lake.

"This is an AWFUL idea!" She protested, struggling to get out of his grip once more.

"Well I'm apparently full of them." Percy responded, stopping at the edge of the dock. "Alrighty, in you go." He said as he tossed her in the lake. Annabeth was well aware of how cold the lake could get, even during the summer, but that didn't make the initial shock of it any less frigid.

"YOU'RE A TERRIBLE BOY FRIEND!" Annabeth sputtered out as she came up for air.

Percy jumped in next to her, and came up after making sure most of the mud had washed off of him. "I'm well aware, because you tell me that about once every two days." He deadpanned. Something caught his eye as he looked past Annabeth's head. "Hey, Nico and Thalia are back." He said, gesturing with his head. Annabeht looked over her shoulder, and indeed they were. Thalia looked happier, and Nico seemed to be as well.

"I'll wait till she comes to me to talk." Annabeth said, not wanting to interfere.

"You think they'll…" Percy trailed off, unsure of how to finish.

Annabeth shrugged. "Who knows. Knowing Thalia, no."

Percy gave her an interesting look. "Why not?"

"A number of reasons." Annabeth responded, sighing and thinking about how she should proceed. Thalia wouldn't like her just spilling a bunch of personal info to Percy without her permission, and she wasn't so sure she wanted to bring up Luke with Percy. Though he had no ill feelings towards Luke, talking about him with Percy still made her feel awkward. "Many of which I'm not even sure about."

"Fair enough." Percy said, nodding in agreement.

After changing and drying off, Annabeth and Percy decided it best to re-watch their escapade that Grover had so kindly posted online for the world to see.

"Well it could be worse." Percy grumbled burying his face into Annabeth's shoulder, who was sitting in his lap.

"I suppose…" Annabeth responded, not happy with the fact that Grover had posted the video without her permission. "No use complaining though. What's done is done."

"Well hey look, we're getting views. Yay?" Percy said, more as a question than an actual enthusiastic statement.

"Not yay. What if my dad sees this?" Annabeth griped. "If he had an suspicions about your level of intelligence before, he'll have them now."

"He doesn't hate me though, that's just your mother." Percy responded defensively. "But wait till she sees this. Let's hope I wake up tomorrow morning."

_KNOCK KNOCK KNOCK. _Annabeth looked over at the door to Percy's cabin, pretty sure she knew who was knocking. "I better go." She said, getting up. "It's more than likely Thalia."

"Yeah probably. Alright, I'll see you after dinner." Percy said, grabbing his laptop and logging on to Facebook.

Annabeth opened the door, and was greeted with who she thought it was. "I was wondering when you'd show up." Annabeth said with a smile that was quickly wiped off her face when she noticed a very important detail was missing from her friend's head. "Thalia… where's your hunter halo?"

* * *

><p><em>It's time for an awful story that happened to me that will explain why this update is LAAAATTTEEEE. Ok, so one Friday about a week an a half ago after Spring Break, I was on my computer at school opening up my chemistry notes. So there I was, clicking the folder when BAM! Whole damn computer freezes up and DIES. So I take it to Mac, and they tell me that my hard drive is fried like burnt toast and that most of my work may never ever be able to be retrieved ever again ever. That includes school notes, projects, research paper files, and all that jazz. So there I am in the Mac store, trying not to cry my eyes about because all my work was GONE. So I bought a new computer, and took my old computer to Data Savers, which I swear are angels sent from heaven. Though it took them about ANOTHER week, not only did they retrieve ALL of my data, the managed to give it to me on a neat little external storage port. SO, the moral of the story is, BACK YOUR FILES UP! Also, updates will continue once a week for both stories until May 17th. Alrighty! <em>


	17. Chapter 16

**Chapter 16: Annabeth is Introduced to Papercraf, Slenderman, and Bonds with her Siblings **

"Ok, so run this by me again, and breathe this time." Annabeth instructed, sitting across from Thalia in Zeus's cabin once again. It seemed as though Aphrodite had hit a dry spell in her mortal romance novels and needed to stir up drama to compensate. Nothing was going right with anyone's relationships apparently.

"Artemis didn't exactly kick me out of the Hunters, but she's giving me one week of mortality to figure things out between Nico and I, at the end of which I must either return to the hunters, or be broken off from them forever with no hope of return or forgiveness." Thalia took a breath, trying not to hyperventilate and continued. "So Nico and I did talk things out on the way back from the woods, and I agreed to go on a date with him because, I mean what choice do I really have?"

"That's great!" Annabeth asked, happy that Thalia was attempting something out of her comfort zone.

"It's not great for me! The last time I was on a date was oh let's see… NEVER." Thalia slumped against the wall, looking distraught. "You've got to help me, Anna. I have no idea what to do."

"Alright, give me a second to think this through." Annabeth weighed her options carefully. Neither she, nor Percy were really great at dating advice. Being as how their relationship really started as to end the blatant sexual tension, and because it was "about time" as Clarisse put it, they had since eased into a really natural and easy routine for both of them. Percy was no good at romance, and being the daughter of a Goddess who put thought over emotion, Annabeth in turn wasn't much good at it either.

That also ruled out her siblings; either they were too young to understand romance, or didn't care. Her two closest ones, Malcolm and Ariadne, wouldn't be much help to her as Malcolm was about as romantic as a brick, and Ariadne barely showed interest in any form of romance at all outside of the Greek Mythos.

The other cabins didn't fair much better. Demeter's cabin usually dated people from Dionysus or Iris's cabin, or other mortal hippies that fit their green life style. Iris's cabin was more freelance than needed, and Ares was out of the question. Hermes and Hephaestus didn't seem very romantic either. Then there was Apollo's cabin. Will had had several relationships in the past, as did many other Apollo campers. However, Annabeth had a feeling that they didn't exactly stick to traditional romantic guidelines. Will charmed the ladies with his natural humor and goofy side, while Apollo's daughters were laid back and easy going, making for drama free relationships with little effort.

That led Annabeth to one, painful conclusion. Though she had loathed the pink monstrosity of a cabin since she first came to the camp, possibly due to it's heinously bright walls, superficial campers, or general air-headedness, she would have to delve into the depths of Aphrodite's cabin. Annabeth thanked the Goddess that she had had a daughter who wasn't as love addicted as her other children, and decided it best to ask Piper for advice.

_KNOCK KNOCK KNOCK _"Piper! Piper are you in there?" Annabeth called as she knocked on the door of the pink cabin of super model heaven. Even from out side, the smell of perfume and hairspray burned her nose.

"Yeah just a second!" There was a sound of footsteps, and then Piper stepped out of the cabin in khaki shorts and a bikini top. "Can I help you?"

"Were you just at the lake a few minutes ago?" Annabeth asked.

"Yep, and I saw Percy take that epic dive off the roof of his cabin! That was so funny!" Piper answered, trying not to laugh. Annabeth rolled her eyes and laughed under her breath, causing Thalia to elbow her to get her refocused.

"Right. Piper, we need your advice." Annabeth said with Thalia nodding in agreement.

Piper looked at the two of them with slight confusion. "Uh… ok but you guys do know that I'm not exactly Aphrodite's most romantic daughter right?"

"That's the point." Thalia answered flatly. "I have a date with Nico."

There was a large commotion in the pink cabin as Drew, Lacy, and one of the few boys in Aphrodite's cabin, Mitchell, came bounding out the door.

"You what?" Drew asked enthusiastically.

"Is that allowed?" Lacy followed.

"Nico has emotions?" Mitchell finished.

Thalia rolled her eyes and sighed in exasperation. "Yes, I have a date with Nico. No, it's technically not allowed, but Artemis is kind of giving me a break in a way, and apparently Nico does have emotions."

"This is too crazy!" Lacy and Mitchell said in tandem.

"I must say I am surprised." Drew stated, leaning against the railing of the porch.

Piper nodded. "For once I actually agree with Drew."

"And that's saying something." Drew commented, giving Piper a begrudging look of acceptance. "Well no use standing around outside. Inside with you, Thalia! Chop chop!" Drew commanded with hand clapping. Piper nodded her siblings and Thalia inside.

"I'll come get you before I leave." Thalia said to Annabeth before following Piper inside and closing the door.

"Why do I get the feeling this is not going to go according to plan…" Annabeth grumbled, walking back towards her cabin.

"And then you fold the sides inwards like this." Malcolm explained to Ariadne as they sat on the porch table, folding paper.

"Ok so it should look like this then, right?" She asked, holding up her piece next to his.

"Yep, that's about right." Malcolm agreed, patting her on the shoulder.

"What are you guys making?" Annabeth asked as she stepped onto the porch.

"Papercraft." Malcolm responded.

"So like, origami?" Annabeth asked as she took a seat next to Ariadne.

"No, Papercraft." Malcolm protested, holding up a small-scale model of a dark elf mage from World of Warcraft made entirely out of paper. "See, not the same."

"Dang, that's cool." Annabeth commented, gingerly taking the paper statue and looking it over. "Where did you learn to do this?"

"The glorious mother internet." Malcolm said, going back to folding.

"What are you making?" Annabeth asked her sister, who was also busy folding paper.

"Currently trying to make Fox McCloud." She responded, taping down the starting of a boot to the base made of cardboard. "However, I probably should have started with something smaller."

"You don't play video games." Annabeth pointed out, wondering why Ariadne would want to make a Smash Brothers character.

Ariadne smiled without looking up from her taping. "No, but August does." Annabeth rolled her eyes. It was almost diabetically sweet how close the two of them were, and they had only met this summer.

"I want to try. Where do I acquire said papercraft?" Annabeth asked.

Malcolm pointed to his computer. "Go crazy."

Annabeth slid the computer onto the table and typed in the first thing that came to mind; Pokémon. "Oh hey cool, I found a decent Girafarig one. Click and print."

"Really, Beth?" Malcolm questioned with a look of mock disbelief. "And you're supposed to be that mature one."

"Hey, call me when you've actually played Pokémon ok?" Annabeth said with a snap of her fingers.

"I have, and I didn't like it." Malcolm grumbled.

"That's because you made Lugia faint before you caught it, and before that you failed to catch that Pikachu you had worked so hard to find." Ariadne mentioned, garnering a look of annoyance from her brother.

"Malcolm, what's that?" Annabeth asked her brother as she sat back down with a pair of scissors and the pattern of a girafarig in front of her. She had caught site of an unstarted pattern sitting next to his pile of paper scraps that seemed very unnerving for some reason.

Malcom picked it up and showed it to her. "That's Slenderman. I wanted to cut him out and hide it somewhere in the Hermes cabin to freak Travis out. Kid's been stealing my headphones one too many times."

"Slenderwhat?" Annabeth should have been used to weird things coming from her brother's mouth, but the interesting thing was that she hadn't even begun to get used to it.

Ariadne gave a mischievous smile that she shared with her brother, who was furiously typing something in on his laptop. "Malcolm and I would like to show you something."

Cue Annabeth, Malcolm, and Ariadne sitting inside the Athena cabin as the sun slowly sank behind the horizon, watching a YouTube channel by the name of MarbleHornets.

"This is just… weird and hard to tell what I'm looking at." Annabeth said under her breath.

"Just wait, it gets worse." Malcolm said, almost laughing with excitement.

"Malcolm, all I see is a bunch of college film students video taping an abandoned house OH GOD WHAT THE HELL WAS THAT?" Annabeth screamed as she fell off her chair due to a very tall, faceless figure in a black suit floating across the window of the house ominously.

"That's slenderman." Ariadne explained as she clicked on the next video.

"What does he uh… do?" Annabeth asked, getting back in her chair, warily looking between her two siblings and then back at the screen.

"The mythos states many different scenarios that can play out if you attract one. Some include time skips that result in you not remembering days, or even months on end. Others involve teleportation with those time skips, which can cause you to not remember where you are or how you got there. There's also mysterious deaths, illnesses, plaguing you with nightmares, and slowly driving you insane." Ariadne ran down, counting on her fingers to make sure she hadn't missed anything.

"Well that's… great." Annabeth gave a weirded out look to both of her siblings before turning back to the screen. "Oh Gods why didn't you tell me he could turn into a spider demon?" Annabeth whined as she buried her head into her knees when she saw that their new friend could grow multiple arms and legs with no apparent dimension, with multiple joints, and for no apparent reason other than to be scary.

They continued on with their movie endeavor, Annabeth not admitting that she was slowly becoming terrified. Suddenly, knocking sounded through the cabin.

_KNOCK KNOCK KNOCK _

"AHH!" All three siblings screamed in unison as Annabeth almost jumped into Malcolm's lap.

"It's just me." Thalia yelled from behind the door. Annabeth quickly got up and answered it, revealing a very cleaned up and beautiful Thalia wearing a skirt. A skirt.

_No, this isn't right. _Annabeth thought to herself.

"Well say something." Thalia grumbled.

"I'm afraid I may faint." Annabeth said through shock. "But you look fantastic!" Annabeth commented as she overcame her state of awe.

"Thanks, but this was the easy part." Thalia complained. "I just came for you to wish me luck."

"Well, good luck!" Annabeth said with a genuine smile.

"I'll text if things go wrong, which may be in a few minutes." Thalia said with an eye roll.

"Look on the bright side! You could be a deer." Ariadne yelled from inside the cabin.

"I second Ariadne's motion!" Malcolm agreed.

"Have fun, you'll be fine." Annabeth reassured her friend. "Tell me how it goes."

"Yeah ok. Well, here goes nothing." Thalia said with a sigh as she stepped off the porch.

Annabeth stepped back inside, only to have neither sibling waiting for her at the table.

"Guys, dinner is going to start soon." She called, looking at the clock, which read they had five minutes. She started to freak herself out as she looked for them, revealing no one in the cabin, even though they couldn't have left without walking by her off the porch. "Ok, this isn't funny." She called out, still not seeing either one of them. She reached into her back pocket for her hat, figuring three could play at this game, only to realize it wasn't there. "Gods be damned." Annabeth cursed under her breath, right before a wet finger stuck itself into her ear. "EW! EW EW EW!"

"Hahaha! Sucks to be you!" Malcolm laughed evilly from his invisible position as his voice darted around the cabin.

"Give it back Mal! You've already got invisibility sunglasses, you don't need my hat!" Annabeth whined, looking around her sharply in the direction of the movement, not knowing if there were one or two sets of footsteps.

"He never said he had your hat." Ariadne's voice whispered into her ear, though Ariadne herself wasn't there. Suddenly, Annabeth was pinned to the ground, with Malcolm pinning her arms to her side and Ariadne straddling her with a sharpie. Both had removed their invisibility cloaks to reveal two matching evil grins.

"Comfy?" Malcolm asked as Annabeth struggled against his grip and Ariadne's weight.

"Screw you." Annabeth hissed.

"Well that's no fun." Ariadne fake pouted. "I just wanted to show you how much I love you." She said, uncapping the pen and pushing up Annabeth's shirt to reveal her stomach.

"Ariadne, no! Don't you dare!" Annabeth threatened.

"Oh my dearest sister, who's to say my art will be slanderous?" Ariadne's fake comforting tone soothed.

"I hate both of you!" Annabeth growled, still struggling.

"Just relax, Beth." Malcolm laughed. "I'm sure you will enjoy this just fine."

* * *

><p><em>So today I was on Half-Blood wiki, and I looked up <strong>Mark of Athena. <strong>The first chapter was read out loud by Rick at his tour of The Kane Chronicles newest book, and it confirms that Leo listens to Dubstep and plays video games. **I CALLED IT AND I WIN FOREVER**. Also, Athena supposedly gives Annabeth a really shitty gift. I'm putting my money on magic chastity belt. Also, I GRADUATED! YAY! More time for writing now! _


	18. Chapter 17

**Chapter 17: Annabeth Really Doesn't Want to Take Sides**

"So are you sure that sunscreen takes sharpie off?" Annabeth asked Percy as he was still laughing at the large print of I WANT TO HAVE MERMAID BABIES WITH SEAWEED BRAIN that Ariadne had so lovingly drawn on her stomach with super industrial strength sharpie.

"Yes I'm sure." He responded. "But I like you're new tattoo."

"Haha shut the hell up." Annabeth grumbled, spraying down her stomach with Bullfrog. To her relief, the sharpie started to instantly melt away with it. "Oh thank the gods."

It was late in the evening while Annabeth and Percy sat in the Poseidon cabin, as Annabeth had tried everything in her power to remove sharpie from her stomach after dinner had ended. When showering, scrubbing vigorously with a wash cloth, lye soap from the kitchen, and even stain remover didn't work, she was left with a very red, but still sharpied upon stomach. It wasn't until Percy saw her seething in the laundry room with bottle of stain remover did she think to ask for advice.

"How did you find this out?" Annabeth asked as she wiped the lettering off.

"I had written down an address on my arm one time, and then went down to the lake for a swim. The sunscreen melted the address right off my arm." He explained, and then went back to giggling at Annabeth's tattoo. "And this is why I'm glad I'm mostly an only child." Percy laughed. Annabeth threw a pillow at him, not finding her situation funny. "Oh come on, it could be worse."

"I'm not saying that I don't want to someday have your children, Percy, but I don't want it printed on my stomach for the whole world to see." Annabeth complained, wiping off her stomach with a paper towel and pulling her shirt back down. Then, her phone buzzed.

"Is that Thalia?" Percy asked, buzzing with excitement. It was amusing to Annabeth that Percy was almost more excited about how the date went than she was.

"Possibly." She answered, turning on her phone and reading the text.

"Things went well. I have a ? when I get back." Thalia texted. Annabeth bit her lip and furrowed her brow, trying to think of what she could possibly need to ask.

"Well?" Percy asked eagerly.

"Things went well she says." Annabeth said, putting her phone away.

"That's it?" Percy seemed almost disappointed in the results.

"For now." Annabeth shrugged, sitting beside Percy on the bed. "We'll just have to wait and hear from her for details."

"So, do demigods mate for life?" Percy asked out of the blue.

"What like sea turtles?" Annabeth asked with a slight chuckle, finding his question funny.

"No not exactly. I mean, like, I don't know. Do demigods stay together forever?" He rephrased awkwardly.

"Many do sure, but it's not a given thing that if two demigods get together that they will stay together." Annabeth answered, studying his face. Percy seemed pretty lost in thought.

"But it is common though, right?" He continued.

"Yes, it is. But you have to understand that demigod relationships last because of shared experiences. That's not to say that I wouldn't love you if we hadn't gone on quests together, but it certainly gives us something to bond over." Annabeth explained, putting a hand on Percy's shoulder.

"But it's not a magic thing like waterbending is right?" He asked.

"Percy, love doesn't work like Twilight werewolf imprinting. Even though we're bonded for life, it's not because of some weird mystic force." Annabeth explained. Percy suddenly looked at her with a surprised expression.

"You've read Twilight?" He asked, looking genuinely scared.

Annabeth turned bright red and had no idea how to respond. Yes, she had. All four books in three days in fact. That's not to say she enjoyed them, but she couldn't deny that they were like literary crack. It was almost physically impossible to put the books down after starting them, no matter how painful the writing was at times.

"I… may have…" She stammered out, biting her lip and looking down.

"What? Wise girl, the wisest of all the wise girls, has read Twilight?" Percy exclaimed through laughter. Annabeth smacked him with yet another pillow.

"Yes, over winter break at my dads house a few years ago! You were in New York, I was feeling bored and had read all of the books in my dads library because he pretty much has the same stock as we do here and my stepmom talked me into it, she's very compelling at times you know, and then I just couldn't stop." Annabeth rambled, the worlds spilling out like water. It didn't do much to settle Percy's laughter as he curled up into a ball on the bed, shaking with giggles.

"I'd expect it from Drew, but seriously Anna you of all people-OOF!" Percy was cut short by Annabeth punching him in the ribs. "Aw man that really hurts you know!" He whined.

"Like you don't have weird interests yourself." Annabeth said, cocking an eyebrow.

"Yeah…" Percy answered feebly, still curled up.

"Well now you have to tell me." Annabeth said, threating him with another fist.

"Ok ok! I mean, it's not that weird… but like I really like Kingdom Hearts." He confessed. Annabeth gave a sigh of exasperation.

"Everyone does, Seaweed Brain. Kingdom Hearts is awesome." Annabeth grumbled.

"I also watch Glee." Percy said, burying his face into another pillow. Now it was her turn to crack up. "Hey, Twilight. You still read Twilight."

"Yeah but I didn't say I liked it!" Annabeth retaliated.

"Yeah well… gah!" Percy gave up as he rolled over and half tackled, half pushed Annabeth back down on the bed and kissed her neck.

_KNOCK KNOCK KNOCK _

"Back so soon?" Percy asked, looking at the door.

"I guess so." Annabeth agreed.

"Anna I know you're in there! I need to talk." Thalia's voice came through the door.

"Alright, let me get my shoes." Annabeth called back.

And there they were again, back in Zeus's cabin with Thalia slumped against the wall, and Annabeth leaning up against the window sill.

"But it was good, right? You had fun?" Annabeth asked, trying to make sense of if Thalia had a good time or not. Her story was good, they had a great night, Nico's a great guy, and they even kissed. It seemed like a happy ending, but Thalia seemed panicked.

"Yes, it was! That's the problem!" She whined.

"I don't see how having a nice time with someone counts as a legitimate problem." Annabeth said, confused as to what exactly was bad.

"Anna, when did you know?" Thalia asked, looking scared.

"Know what?" Annabeth wasn't sure exactly what Thalia was referencing, but had a hunch.

"When did you know that Percy was right for you?" She asked again.

Annabeth thought for a second before answering. "My second summer."

"That long?" Thalia seemed surprise.

"More like the end of my first summer, but the second summer was when I understood how I felt." Annabeth explained.

"So why didn't you tell him earlier?" Thalia asked, still surprised.

"Because I wasn't sure if he was going to actually live through the war. Anyways, what does my relationship have to do with your date?" Annabeth asked, trying to make a connection.

"Because I don't know how I feel! I really do like Nico, I do. He's great and I can totally see myself dating him. But, I mean, you and Percy did life or death quests together and were bffs for a really long time, and you know everything about each other and are totally bonded. But I really don't know Nico super well, and I don't think a week is enough to cover that. I mean sure we've hung out here and there, and he's been around when I've been around, but neither of us stick around camp long enough to actually get to know each other." Thalia explained, looking distressed.

It wasn't untrue, what Thalia was saying. Annabeth couldn't deny the fact that she and Percy had become a couple under very different circumstances. And it was also true that regardless of a war, she had waited and gotten to know Percy before jumping head first into anything.

"Maybe you should go for it. You wouldn't be second guessing the hunters if something wasn't there." Annabeth said, feeling right about her stance.

"I just don't know. I wish it were that simple." Thalia answered, barely above a whisper.

"Look, I can't make this decision for you. I've stated what I think, but emotions aren't a group effort. What you feel is what you feel, not what everyone else tells you to." Annabeth said, trying to be helpful without taking a side.

"I guess you're right. I've still got the rest of the week to think things over anyways. Might as well use that time." Thalia agreed. "You know, you're better at this emotion stuff than you lead on." She said with a smile.

"You think so? Well good to know that if my plans for architecture fall through, I can fall back on being a therapist." Annabeth joked.

"Maybe so, but let's not get too hasty." Thalia said with a laugh. The two of them said their goodnights, and walked out of Zeus's cabin towards their own respective cabins. Before Annabeth could reach her own, a voice stopped her.

"Annabeth. Hey, Annabeth." It whispered from a nearby tree. Annabeth looked up to see August drop down from the branches. "Um… some of the hunters told me to tell you to meet them in the arena." August said, looking a little nervous.

"And?" Annabeth asked, knowing August was hiding something.

"I… wouldn't go if I were you." August finished, biting her lip.

"Why not?" Annabeth asked, still confused to why August wouldn't want her to go.

"They don't look very pleased." August continued. "They didn't want me to tell you that."

"How many are there?" Annabeth asked. If they were planning an ambush for their fallen cohort, she would need back up.

"Six I think." August guessed.

"Take this and follow close behind." Annabeth said as she handed August her invisibility hat. "I trust that your training has been coming along well enough."

A cocky smile flashed across August's face before she dawned the hat and disappeared. "Better than well I'd say."

The two of them made their way to the arena, August staying a few meters behind Annabeth. Once they reached the arena, Annabeth gave a slight hand signal for August to wait outside.

"Hello? It's me, Annabeth." She called inside.

"We were wondering if you'd even show up." Phoebe, one of the longer running hunters said as she stepped forward from the shadows.

"Bout time." Sarah, another hunter who looked to be about Clarisse's size and stature, agreed.

"We need to talk to you." Another voice spoke up, belonging to an older girl, whom Annabeth had only met once, by the name of Alex.

"Yeah, ok. What's up?" Annabeth asked, hoping to avoid conflict.

"You need to tell Thalia to stop hanging around Nico and come back to us." Phoebe demanded.

"Yeah, she doesn't belong here. She belongs with us!" Sarah agreed.

"Look, I can't tell her to do one thing or the other," Annabeth tried to reason. "This is Thalia's decision. She's a big girl and can handle this hers-"

"Well she obviously can't if she's been coming to you for advice." Alex interjected.

"That's what friends do for friends. They give each other advice." Annabeth retorted.

"Then tell her to drop that emo and come back to us!" Phoebe demanded yet again.

"It's not my decision!" Annabeth once again stated. "Now you can try to talk to her all you want, but I'm not going to stoop to your level and mess with her head just so you all can have it your way. I'm her best friend, and I'm not about to mess with her feelings like that." She defended.

"Well then we're doing this the hard way." Alex stated. "Lock the doors."

Suddenly, two younger hunters closed the large wooden doors to the arena, effectively surrounding Annabeth and locking August out.

_Dammit. I should have seen this coming from a mile away. _Annabeth thought to herself as she brandished her knife.

BANG BANG BANG "Annabeth! ANNABETH!" August called from the other side.

"So you brought back up then. Too bad that plan failed." One of the younger hunters teased.

Annabeth sighed and braced herself. "Alrighty then. Bring it on."

* * *

><p><em>Yep, the sunscreen trick actually works. Best if using spray stuff like Bullfrog or Banana Boat spray on. The Percabeth scene in this story is actually my favorite one I have written so far, but I don't really know why. I guess because it's just real. Or something. Also, Twilight fans don't get angry. I don't hate, like, despise, or love Twilight. I really could care less about the books or movies, but I had to throw a pop culture reference somewhere in here. So love it or hate it, just know that I don't personally hate Twilight. In fact, I really don't care either way. <em>


	19. Chapter 18

**Chapter 18: Annabeth vs The World **

If there was one thing Annabeth knew about the Hunters, it's that you don't fight a group of them single handedly. The Hunters are trained day and night to always be ready for a fight, and no matter how good you are, even just two of them was enough to take even some of the best down. Annabeth was a clever fighter, she knew that as a fact, but even she wasn't hubristic enough to take on more than two at a time. And yet, here she was, locked in a battle arena with six angry huntresses with her knife, and no hat to help her get around. Things looked bleak.

"Go!" Phoebe yelled as all six of the huntresses lunged. Annabeth ducked as best as she could, slicing where openings allowed, but was still out numbered greatly. The only thing she could do was keep most of them at bay while she attempted to duck out of the center of the group and head for the door, but she was having no such luck.

_WOOSH _"Give up!" Sarah called as her dagger swooped across Annabeth's head.

"NEVER!" Annabeth called back, kicking the girl square in the jaw. Alex caught Annabeth's leg and flipped her onto the ground, but Annabeth rolled right before Alex could curb stomp her ribs. Unfortunately, a younger huntress caught her on her way up and delivered a sucker punch to the left side of her face.

"Oof!" Annabeth staggered back into a case of lances. She pulled one off and started swinging. "I don't go down that easily." She threatened, spinning the lance menacingly. She thanked her mother than she had chosen to take up bo staff martial arts as a hobby as opposed to yoga.

"We'll see about that." Another huntress growled. They charged again, only this time Annabeth was at a little bit more of an advantage as she knocked two down with a smack of the staff, hitting another on the other side of her in the jaw. Unfortunately, Annabeth was still outnumbered as Phoebe jumped on her back, and Sarah grabbed the lance and threw it to the ground. It took the other three hunters to subdue finally Annabeth. By the time she had run out of steam, two hunters had knocked her to her knees and were holding her in place, while Phoebe loomed over her and took her hunting knife out.

"Last shot. You either tell Thalia to drop the guy, or-"

"Or what? You kill me?" Annabeth cut Phoebe off. "Yeah ok. How's that gonna fly with Artemis? Or better yet, my mother. You kill me, you suffer the wrath of both of them, and I know for a fact neither of them will let this go by lightly."

Phoebe's smile faded as shook her head. "Kill you? Look, Annabeth, we're angry, not evil."

"Yeah, we're not nearly as crazy as you think we are." Alex agreed.

"No dear, I don't want you dead." Phoebe walked over to Annabeth and tilted her chin up. "I've always envied your hair you know." She said, pulling a gold ringlet and watching it bounce back into place.

Annabeth's breath caught as she realized what Phoebe had planned. "You don't want to do that." She growled threateningly while struggling against both Sarah and Alex, who had a firm grip on her and weren't letting up.

Phoebe let out an evil chuckle. "It would be such a shame to see it cut short." She mused, taking a fist full of Annabeth's hair and drawing the knife close.

**CRASH **"WHAT'S GOING ON IN HERE?" A voice yelled as both double doors broke open, sending pieces of the wooden bar holding it locked flying. All six hunters and Annabeth looked up to see a very livid Artemis, no longer in child form, standing in the doorway with a nervous looking August standing behind her. Artemis looked to be about thirty, wearing a silver breast plate, leather hunting boots, and a fur skirt that made her look more like an Elder Scrolls character than a Greek God, but ten times more menacing.

"My lady! We were just-" Phoebe tried to explain, but was cut off as Artemis stepped closer, looming over the group.

"Just sticking your nose where it doesn't belong. I told all of you that Thalia was under special circumstances, and not to interfere! And look what you go and do!" She looked around the group, all of which looked very frightened and guilty, save for Annabeth. "Disobeying direct orders is normally grounds for expulsion and sometimes transfiguration. Who's idea was this?"

"I-it was my idea, my lady." Phoebe stammered out, looking down at the ground.

"You two, let Annabeth go." Artemis demanded. Alex and Sarah were too stunned to move. "NOW." Artemis boomed, snapping them out of their fear long enough for them to let go, and for Annabeth to back away. "Annabeth, go back to your cabin for the evening. I need to have a word with these ladies." She instructed.

"Yes my lady. Thank you for your help." Annabeth said as she hastily bowed and walked towards the exit.

August was waiting for her by the doors. "I couldn't think of what to do, so I called Artemis." August said, shrugging. "I hope that's ok. Oh, and here's your hat back."

Annabeth patted her on the shoulder as they walked out of the arena together. "You did just fine, August. Just fine."

"Were they really going to cut your hair?" Ariadne asked the next day after breakfast as she, Annabeth, and August, and Piper sat on the Athena cabin roof, watching campers go by.

"Probably. Phoebe and I never really saw eye to eye anyways." Annabeth answered as she folded a piece of paper. "Why am I always the victim of insanity around here?"

"Because you can take it. Anyone of us would probably go insane and attempt to eat our own shirts." August answered, not looking up from the book she was reading.

"Glad they didn't cut it. That would suck." Piper said, looking disgusted.

"You're telling me. You know how hard it is to keep it healthy when it's this thick and long? I work hard to make it look this good and I'm not about to let some young huntress punk ruin that for me." Annabeth griped, throwing a paper airplane off of the top of the roof.

"August, what are you reading?" Piper asked, tilting the book to get a better look at the cover.

"Only the greatest comic ever written ever." August answered. "Scott Pilgrim."

"Oh yeah. Didn't they make a movie about it last year?" Annabeth asked.

"Yeah, it was pretty good. Nice special effects, good writing. The books are better though." August said, finish the last page and closing the book. "Here, I've already read them all. You should try them out." She said, handing the book the Annabeth.

"Thanks, I will." Annabeth said, taking the book and looking at the cover. Then, the bell rang for the next class.

BANG BANG BANG. "August open up!" Annabeth yelled at the Apollo cabin door. It was only just after lunch, and Annabeth had already blasted through the first volume of Scott Pilgrim. She couldn't explain it, but Scott Pilgrim was amazing. Between the witty dialog, humor, action, cool characters, and video references, Scott Pilgrim had become her new favorite thing.

August opened the door with a sly smile, and handing Annabeth the next issue. "Here, give me the other one."

"How did you know?" Annabeth asked.

"Because I did the exact same thing when I first got a hold of them." August answered. Annabeth noticed that August was wearing a familiar set of goggles on her head.

"Are those…" She trailed off as August nodded.

"Yup, Ramona Flowers! Gottem at a midnight release party for the last book." August answered proudly.

Annabeth shook her head with a smile. "These are addicting. I'll be back before nightfall." She said, walking towards her cabin.

"Alrighty, see ya." August responded with a laugh.

As Annabeth walked down the cabin line, a familiar voice came up behind her.

"What are we reading today?" Will asked, looking over her shoulder.

"Your little sister is letting me borrow her Scott Pilgrim books. They're awesome." Annabeth said, showing him the cover.

"You seen the movie yet?" He asked walking backwards in front of her now.

"No I haven't." She answered.

"Let me know when you finish those, and I'll set up a kick butt awesome movie night for the Scott Pilgrim fans in the camp. It'll be great!" Will said, looking excited at the prospect.

"Totally. I'll provide the soda." Annabeth said with a laugh.

"Annabeth," Percy's voice said from his porch as she walked by. "Come inside, I need to talk to you."

* * *

><p><em>Yeah Scott Pilgrim is totally awesome. Yeah I totally envisioned the fight scene with sound effect letters around it the whole time. Yeah Annabeth leveled up during the fight in my head.<br>Also, I know this is a short chapter, but it was originally supposed to be tagged on with the next chapter, but that would make that chapter like a billion words long. So here's a nice short chapter for all of you to enjoy. Also, now that summer has started, updates will come at minimum twice a week. Yay! _


	20. Chapter 19

**Chapter 19: Annabeth Rethinks Her Life **

"So wait, Nico wants her to stay with the hunters? That doesn't make sense!" Annabeth whined.

"He told me that he never meant to cause trouble, and that this whole idea with Thalia was a dumb mistake." Percy said, sitting down on his bed and letting his head hang. "Why do people come to us with their romance problems when there's a whole pink cabin filled with people who would love to give them advice? Heck, I'm not even that great with Romance in the first place! I just happened to get really really lucky at a very convenient time when it came to actually becoming a couple with you." He complained.

Annabeth sat next to him and leaned her head on his shoulder. "I've been asking that question for several days now."

"Does she even like him?" Percy asked.

"Does Thalia like Nico?" Annabeth clarified. Percy nodded. "Well she said she finds him attractive, but she doesn't know anything about the guy."

Percy looked up at Annabeth with a look that signaled and epiphany. "I never thought of that."

"Thought of what?" Annabeth asked.

"The two of them really haven't spent a lot of time with each other." Percy continued, standing up and pacing. "I mean, come to think of it, neither of them are around enough to even establish a decent friendship, let alone relationship."

"That's what I thought at first too." Annabeth agreed.

"Why would Nico want to… I mean it just seems so… gah! I'm just so…" Percy stammered on, frustrated.

"Confused?" Annabeth helped.

"Yes! That's it! Confused." Percy agreed enthusiastically. "I mean, what do they even bond over?"

Then it was Annabeth's turn to have an epiphany. "Loss." Annabeth said. "And the need to escape."

"What?" Percy looked at Annabeth like she had just solved a very hard puzzle.

"I've been thinking about that. I mean, aside from a pretty face on his part and the whole Zeus's children are always naturally attractive thing from her, they really don't have a lot to bond over." Annabeth explained. "I mean sure, they both have an appreciation for the alternative sub-cultured life styles, punk and Goth respectively, but that only goes so far. If people fell in love for superficial reasons, well then the entire planet would be one giant high school."

"So you're saying that they bonded because of their shared experiences." Percy concluded.

"Exactly!" Annabeth exclaimed. "Lets take you and I for example."

"Ok." Percy said, sitting down on the bed again and listening.

"Like I said before yesterday, I started to like you because you were cute, funny, and charmingly dopy, but I fell in love with you because you and I shared experiences together." She explained.

"You think I'm charming?" Percy asked, getting of topic.

Annabeth sighed and shook her head. "Back to the point, think about their two big emotional scares they both have. Thalia," she started, counting on her fingers "loss of a sibling, parental disconnection, waking up several years after you've been put into hyper sleep only to be in a world where you're a chosen one and things are scary and different from what you remember. And now lets look at Nico. Same, exact, thing!" She said, punctuating the last words with emphasis.

"Geeze…" Percy said, lying back on his bed. "I never would have put any of that together."

"Nico can't give up now. Not when he's so close." Annabeth said, going back to whining.

"I agree. I'll go talk to him." Percy said, standing up and walking towards the door.

"And I'll go find Thalia." Annabeth concluded, and they both stepped out of the cabin, running off in opposite directions.

Annabeth found Thalia exactly where she thought she would; sitting on the edge of the cliff like overlook of the lake, carving away at a forgotten stick with her hunting knife.

"Thalia, I need to talk to you." Annabeth said, out of breath from running all the way up the steep hill, and all throughout camp looking for her.

Thalia looked up and patted the ground next to her. "Take a seat, I've been doing some thinking."

"That's good." Annabeth responded, sitting next to Thalia on the dry summer ground.

"You remember what you said a few days ago when you snapped at me? About how running away doesn't solve problems." Thalia asked.

Annabeth just nodded in response. She didn't want to be berated again for something she thought she had put behind her.

"You were right, again." Thalia said with a shrug. "Even when I woke up from my six year snooze, I started thinking about how things didn't go as planned."

"You did?" Annabeth asked, confused. Thalia out of the whole trio seemed like the least effected by her time on the road.

"So much just went to wrong so fast." Thalia started. "For one thing, I kind of died." Thalia said with a sarcastic look on her face. "And then upon waking up, I was greeted with a boat load of changes from my friends, and not just Luke." Thalia stared off into the distance, not exactly looking sad, but not looking happy either. She looked very lost in thought, like trying to figure out a very hard math equation in her head. "When I woke up, I thought that everything would just go back to normal, you know? We would save Luke, and the three of us would live happily ever after at Half-Blood."

"That really didn't happen." Annabeth grumbled, resting her head on her knees. "Fucking Kronos. Ruined everything."

"It wasn't really Kronos that tipped things off that nothing was or would be the same." Thalia said. Annabeth looked at her with an expression that let Thalia know she needed to explain things further.

"First of all, you weren't seven anymore." Thalia said like it was obvious. "You were this person who I had never met before, with interests and a personality that was totally different from when I last remember you. You went from this plucky seven year old to this cocky and yet totally reserved bad ass."

"Change tends to happen when people age, yes." Annabeth said, starting to get it.

"And then there was Percy. Now don't get me wrong, I love Percy, really I do. He's been like the brother I never had, but then again I do have that brother, he was just Roman and in hiding…" Thalia trailed off and nodded, knowing that what she said didn't make much sense. "But Percy really took up the void in you that Luke had once filled. Every time I saw you with him, I knew that Luke was becoming more and more a thing of the past for you."

Annabeth shook her head vigorously in protest. "That's not really true, you know that! I fought for Luke till the very end!"

"Annabeth, look me in the eye and tell me that there wasn't even the smallest part of you that knew Luke wasn't coming back from the beginning." Thalia said with a very serious expression.

Annabeth looked down at the ground. It was true; she had been in denial for all those years when it was obvious that Luke wasn't coming home any time soon.

She thought back to her time at camp with Luke before Percy was around. After Thalia's "death", Luke never recovered. He became more dethatched, even though he put on a mask of happy camp counselor in front of everyone else. There was something behind his eyes that bothered Annabeth greatly, like a deep sense of hurt that would never go away, no matter how hard she tried to fix that. Whatever caused him to hurt so much also caused him to take it out on Annabeth in many ways. He was always treating her like a little sister, but just like a big brother would. Yes, there were some genuinely nice moments between the two of them, when he would comfort her when she was scared or angry, or when they would just talk in the afternoons after lunch.

But more often than not, there was a lot of teasing. Mean teasing. Luke acted much like a big brother would to a bratty little sister, minus the little sister actually being bratty. There was the name calling, first of all. He'd throw names at Annabeth like 'egg head', 'ultra dork', 'nerdariffic,' and even 'walking book shelf', playing them off with a laugh at the end like he didn't mean them in a mean way, but that didn't make them feel any better to little kid Annabeth. Names were names, not matter how you sliced them.

Then there was the fact that he didn't care at all about her hobbies, and wasn't afraid to let her know that. Instead of nodding politely like Percy did when she went on a speech about a new blue print she was working on, a new invention, or battle tactic, Luke would say something along the lines of 'I seriously don't care' or 'that's really boring and nerdy.' She tried to hide the fact that his disinterest bothered her, but it hurt more than anything. All she ever wanted to do was share her life's dreams with him, and he couldn't be bothered to care.

Luke didn't just get away with emotional torture either. From wet willies, to headlocks, grabbing her ear and twisting, or a number of other annoying sibling tactics, Luke knew how to get a rise out of Annabeth. And boy, did he love doing it.

"You know something, Thalia? For the longest time, I let Luke get away with treating me like crap because I thought that it was all in good fun." Annabeth said after about a minute or so of flashing back.

"Why did you do that?" Thalia asked, not happy with Annabeth not sticking up for herself.

"Because he was all I really had, and I didn't know any better. He played it off like typical brother sister stuff, the teasing, the ignoring me, the wet willies and stuff. I mean the other kids did it to each other, so I let it slide." Annabeth explained, mad at herself for not seeing things clearly earlier. "He took the fact that he was angry at the world out on me, because he knew that I wouldn't leave him no matter what." Annabeth let her head hang between her knees. "You are right. I knew Luke was a gonner even before Percy came along."

"And I wasn't around to see any of that." Thalia said. "I came back after the fact that Luke went evil. There was no warning, no tell tale signs, no conversations about it. I wasn't there to talk to Luke and tell him to stop taking his shit out on you, I wasn't there to help him when you were too little to know what to do, and I especially wasn't there when he decided to throw it all away. I woke up, and BOOM, Luke was evil." Thalia continued, standing up and pacing much like Percy was a few minutes ago. "And it didn't stop at Luke either! You, my gods, you were so completely different!" She said exasperatedly, gesturing at Annabeth. "You were tall, and pretty, and smarter than anyone in the word, you had interests that I never knew you even liked, you made up with your father, were this completely normal and amazing person. And you also had Percy."

Annabeth watched Thalia get more and more worked up, but said nothing. Thalia had never expressed any of this to her, and Annabeth would be damned if she said anything to ruin this moment. This conversation needed to happen way sooner than it was.

"And because of Percy, I panicked." Thalia finished.

"What?" Annabeth couldn't believe that.

"You don't get it do you?" Thalia asked. Annabeth shook her head. "Even before you two were a thing, you took an a completely different personality when you were around him. You were nicer, happier, more playful and less caught up in the world around you. He's your lighthouse in the sea of horrible shit that had happened in your life, and he made Luke fade out." Thalia stopped and looked at Annabeth, taking a deep breath. "But the worst part of all of that, was that Percy is exactly what you need. There is literally nothing poisonous about your relationship with him, and that freaked me out. I thought if Luke could fade out so easily, that what makes me any different."

"So you ran." Annabeth answered, putting the pieces together in her head.

"My life was not anything like it had been after I woke up, Annabeth! Luke, the only person who I was certain I could have fallen in love with, was evil, you were nothing like I had remembered, Percy was this new hero that overshadowed everyone in his mighty heroicness, there was a war, and I was almost the chosen one!" Thalia said like it was all obvious. "Of course I panicked! Joining the Hunters seemed like the only path that seemed less likely to change suddenly and crumbled out from underneath me, so I took it."

"I never thought of it that way." Annabeth said quietly.

"Because you had other things around you going on. I'm surprised you even had time to breath during those years." Thalia said with a chuckled. "But I've been thinking," She continued, calming down and taking her seat next to Annabeth on the ground "that maybe I don't need to be in the Hunters anymore."

Annabeth was speechless hearing that. "Seriously?" She asked, stunned.

"The Hunters, like I said, was an escape plan. It was the only door that open that seemed less likely to be filled with things I couldn't handle." Thalia nodded her head, like she had just made up her mind about something, her electric blue eyes flashing with emotion. "But I don't need that escape plan anymore. Jason is back, you're doing just fine, the wars, as for right now are over, and things are better. As much as I like being a leader, I kind of just want to stay put somewhere for a while. Even if its not really a normal place, I want to just be somewhere steady. Half-Blood, as nutty as things can get, is steady."

"Like home?" Annabeth finished.

"Yeah, home sounds good." Thalia nodded.

* * *

><p><em>I'm going to be the first to say that this chapter isn't funny at all. In fact, it's very emotional.<br>I'd also like to point out that the one thing I really didn't like at the original Percy Jackson series was the fact that Rick left all of these gaping wounds open on so many character and just never bothered to close them. Now as a writer, I get that having a chip on your shoulder can make for an interesting character trait, but at the end of The Last Olympian I was thinking to myself "is he really just going to leave the Luke/Thalia/Annabeth story line open like that?" There was really now closure between Thalia and Annabeth, even though it was pretty obvious that a lot of their problems stem from that story line. So this is my take on some closure between Thalia and Annabeth about Luke and how things changed.  
>Aside from that, THIS IS NOT THE LAST CHAPTER FOR THIS STORY. And I promise that the next chapters will have humor, this was just a little experiment on my part. <em>


	21. Chapter 20

**Chapter 20: Annabeth Chase Takes a Tumbl**

It was around 10 AM the next day inside a darkened Athenian cabin. Annabeth once again blew her nose, and tossed the tissue into the wastebasket next to her bed. She had meant to go help Percy talk to Nico, and she had meant to also help Thalia talk to Artemis. However, upon waking up with sore throat, a headache, and a congested nose, Annabeth realized that she had indeed caught a summer cold. It had hit quick and without any warning, much like a ninja. Annabeth wondered if it was punishment for telling Thalia Apollo's Xbox secret.

Suddenly, the door flew open. "Annabeth! What are you doing in bed! You've got to help me talk to Artemis, remember?"

"I can't." Annabeth coughed. "I'm thick." She wheezed as Thalia stood over her bed.

"You promised you'd help me!" Thalia whined in response.

"I can barely move." Annabeth protested. "I'm sthure you can do it yourthelf."

"Not fair!" Thalia once again whined. "This is the worst possible time for you to catch a summer cold, you know that?"

"Not my fault my imbune thystem thucks." Annabeth croaked. "Bethides, Ardemisth will listhen to you more than she would me."

"Gah, fine! You've obviously left me with little other option here." Thalia surrendered. "Get well, or else!"

"Yes yes, I will." Annabeth agreed waving to Thalia half-heartedly as she walked out the door.

Annabeth turned over in her bunk and shivered. She remembered the last time she had gotten sick at camp with a cold was right after she came back from the sea of monsters, and it took a good week to recover fully. She hoped this time wouldn't be like the last, but was a little more ok with her current sickness considering that Percy would actually be willing to spend time with her while she was sick, as opposed to stay ten feet away at all times when he was thirteen.

Annabeth was about to drift off into a sickness induced sleep when footsteps interrupted her daze.

"Hey…" A voice whispered behind Annabeth. "Hey, hey Annabeth. Hey Annabeth. Annabeth, hey."

"Malcolm." Ananbeth hissed, knowing the annoying voice of her brother from anywhere. "Shut up."

"Well fine, be that way to your brother who may or may not have a cure for your ailment." Malcolm responded.

Annabeth sat up and looked at Malcolm blearily. "You what?"

"I've calculated the exact amount of Nectar needed to cure the common cold! This should do the trick." Malcolm said, holding up a shot glass of golden liquid. Where he got the shot glass Annabeth hadn't a clue, but something told her the Dionysus cabin might have had a hidden stash.

"Malcolm, you know as well as I do that nectar doesthn't cure coldsth." Annabeth said, flopping back down on her side.

"Yes it does. Chiron just tells us not to use it to cure colds because if we take too much we burst into flames, which is arguably worse than having a cold." Malcolm rebutted. "Now lets do shots! Shots shots-shots shots shots Err' boday!" He chanted, handing her the shot glass.

Annabeth turned back over towards Malcolm, who seemed unusually cheerful today, and sighed. "If I die," Annabeth said, looking at Malcolm with a disgruntled expression, "you stay away from my funeral." She took a deep breath and took the shot. Her head instantly uncongested itself, almost making her light headed, and her throat felt as if it had just been healed from the inside out. It taste good, like nectar normally does, but there was a distinct after burn that she was not used to. "Oh look, here come the flames." She groaned, flopping down again.

"It'll clear up, trust me." Malcolm said. "Would it help to look at funny pictures on Tumblr?"

"On what now?" Annabeth once again croaked. The cold had indeed subsided, but the flames in her chest had yet to.

"You don't know about Tumblr?" Malcolm asked with a smile. "It's the word of the day!"

"Oh gods." Annabeth groaned. "Why are you so cheery today?"

"Because reasons." He answered, getting his laptop out. "This is mine, see." Malcolm pointed to the screen. "You can post just about anything. From quotes, to links, to gifs!" He said enthusiastically.

"What's a gif?" Annabeth asked, the heartburn slowly subsiding.

"A moving picture." Malcolm answered, pointing to one of the gifs on his page, which was of Carlton from the Fresh Prince of Bel-Air doing the "Carlton."

Annabeth watched as Malcolm scrolled through his page. He had video game gifs, links, quotes, and pictures. In fact, the name of his Tumblr was 'Captain Malcolm; King of the Elder Scrolls.' If Malcolm wasn't a video game master, no one was. Annabeth didn't know if Athena was proud of her son and his use of skill and strategy, or embarrassed that her gifts were being used on something so trivial. Apparently, Malcolm didn't care either way.

"So it's basically a site for the random and obscene?" Annabeth concluded.

"Well not all Tumblr profiles are the same. See, look at this one," Malcolm gestured as he clicked on a new link from his own. "This one is dedicated to weird facts."

"Huh, interesting." Annabeth mumbled as she rolled onto her stomach to get a better look. The amount of useless crap people could post online was genuinely frightening.

"Yeah, and this one is all about My Little Pony. Actually, there are a lot of them that are dedicated to that…" Malcolm said, looking at the side links and rolling his eyes.

"Oh gods, who's idea was it to photoshop a human face onto an orange?" Annabeth asked, seeing another gif with just that.

"Oh, that's the annoying orange." Malcolm said like it was obvious.

"The what now?" Annabeth asked. "Wait. Do I want to know?"

"You have no choice now! Mwahaha!" Malcolm laughed evilly as he clicked onto YouTube.

"I feel much better and am in a position to leave at any time now." Annabeth reminded him, indeed feeling better since her shot of nectar.

"Yeah ok, whatever. Just watch this." Malcolm said dismissively, pointing to the screen.

Annabeth turned her attention over to Malcolm's laptop and watched. The videos were not anything Annabeth had expected. They were literally videos of fruit with faces photoshopped onto them. She found it weird, and a little unnerving.

"Hey… hey apple! Hey Apple! Hey!" The orange chanted.

"Oh look, it's you." Annabeth deadpanned.

"Shh… just watch." Malcolm urged.

They continued to watch several of these YouTube videos in silence, each one more annoying and repetitive than the last, before Annabeth couldn't take it anymore. "This really is the most annoying thing I've ever seen! I'm leaving."

"No, no wait you can't!" Malcolm protested. "I want to-"

"Malcolm I don't care." Annabeth said, cutting him off. "I don't want to watch anymore annoying fruits!"

"It's not the orange again I swear!" Annabeth stopped moving towards the door and looked at her brother. "Let's make you a Tumblr!"

"Do we have to?" Annabeth asked, still not understanding what put Malcolm in such a happy mood, and not really in the mood to goof off when she had promises to keep.

"Yes. Yes we do." Malcolm responded sternly. "Pick an idea, any idea."

"The idea of I have to go help my best friend with man trouble or else she may eat me." Annabeth deadpanned, slumping back down on the bed. "That's an idea."

"Nah, something funny. Or cool." Malcolm suggested.

"Why do I let you talk me into horrible things?" Annabeth groaned.

"This isn't horrible. Consider it another immersion into the wonderful wide web." Malcolm said, walking over to Annabeth's trunk and grabbing her laptop.

"And I need to be immersed because?" Annabeth asked, still not seeing the point.

"Because the world is changing due to the Internet everyday, and Half-Blood isn't part of the real world. Like it or not, this will all become mainstream in a year tops." Malcolm answered. "Ok, now pick something."

"How about I just post everything weird that you've ever showed me, and call it 'brotherly love.'" Annabeth suggested, meaning it more as a sarcastic comment than anything serious.

Malcolm stared at her for a few seconds with a thoughtful expression. "Anna, that's a brilliant idea."

"Wait what?" Annabeth cocked an eyebrow. She meant the comment as an insult, not an actual idea.

"But don't just limit it to me! Post everything anyone shows you on the Internet that you haven't seen before!" Malcolm exclaimed with an excited expression on his face. "Ok, get your laptop out. Let's start posting!"

In no time, Annabeth and Malcolm had created a new Tumblr blog by the name of _Annabeth Chase's Big Super Awesome Fun Time Blog_, and had posted everything anyone had showed her. From Malcolm's YouTube videos, to weird pictures, horrible ways to kill Sims, movies, and even Slender Man, her blog was soon brimming with oddities. By the time they were done, it looked like the Internet threw up on a blog. It even had a Nyan-cat background.

"Well I must say that this is not your average posting." Malcolm commented as Annabeth made the last few changes.

"Let's just hope that the comments I get aren't from people who are complaining of brain damage suffered from clicking on this page." Annabeth once again deadpanned. "Alright, as fun as this was I really have to get going."

"Thalia?" Malcolm guessed.

Annabeth nodded. "You have no earthly idea."

"I can only imagine." Malcolm responded sarcastically. "I've got to head out too. I'm suppose to teach bo staff one o' one in ten minutes."

"Well look at you being all responsible for once." Annabeth jibed.

"Once in a blue moon, this Athenian likes to make his mother proud." Malcolm responded with a cheesy faux-heroic smile.

Both of them stood up and walked outside. Annabeth felt light-years better than she had when she woke up, though her sinuses felt like they may crack open and start bleeding at any minute, and she still felt lethargic.

"What are you doing outside?" Percy's voice came from her left as Annabeth stepped off the porch.

"I promised to help Thalia to help talk to Artemis, and I promised you I'd help find Nico and talk to him." Annabeth said, falling in next to him.

"Aren't you sick?" He asked.

"Malcolm apparently calculated exactly how much nectar it takes to cure the common cold. Though, I think he's still a little off." Annabeth explained, stretching to try and wake her muscles up.

"Well I think I may have found Nico. I'll meet you in my cabin in a half hour?" Percy asked.

Annabeth nodded. "Sounds good. Let me just go clear things up with… oh no…"

"Um… earth to Annabeth. What are you- oh my gods." Percy caught site of what Annabeth was staring at and realized that Artemis may have been more serious with her threats than either he or Annabeth had thought. In front of them was a seriously pissed off looking jackalope.

"Oh my gods THALIA!" Annabeth cried, running over to the deer-bunny hybrid and picking it up, holding the creature eye level. "I thought you said she'd understand!"

"She did," A voice from behind her responded. "That's Phoebe."

Annabeth turned around to see Thalia, looking just as human as she ever did. She turned back towards the Phoebelope and gave an evil grin. "Serves you right for ambushing me."

"How long is she stuck like that?" Percy asked, now laughing at the hunter's predicament.

"A week." Thalia responded, now giggling despite herself. "We should paint her antlers bright orange." Phoebe kicked and squirmed in protest.

"No, let's not cause any more trouble then we've already." Annabeth said, trying to keep a grip on Phoebe so she wouldn't drop her. Phoebe stopped squirming, but the pissed off look in her eyes didn't lighten up.

"So what happened?" Annabeth asked as she set Phoebe down.

"I'm out." Thalia answered with a shrug.

"You're out?" Annabeth asked, looking for more clarification.

"Well when I went to talk to Artemis, I asked her what she would do in my situation." Thalia started.

"And?" Percy coaxed.

"Artemis told me that she always thought I had gotten in for the wrong reasons, and that I deserve to live as normal a life as I can." Thalia answered. "So she let me off scot-free. From this moment on, I'm no long Thalia the Huntress, and am now Thalia, Daughter of Zeus."

"That's amazingly awesome." Annabeth said almost at a whisper and almost in happy tears. "This means you're sticking around then?"

"Looks like it." Thalia answered with a genuine smile. The two friends embraced, but were quickly interrupted.

"Alright, I hate to break this up but we've got to find Nico." Percy motioned back towards his cabin. "If he's still in the state that is." He added with a rundown tone.

"What?" Thalia squeaked.

"Nico may or may not have concluded that he's more trouble than he's worth and left camp." Percy explained sheepishly. "So we have to go find him."

Thalia stared at Percy, dumfounded. "That, asshole!" She growled. "Who does he think he is just running off like that when he knows exactly how much shit he's put me through? The second we find him, I'm going to kick his ass!"

Phoebe and Annabeth looked at each other, the jackalope seeming like she didn't want to miss any of the action.

"Ok, you said you know where he is?" Annabeth asked Percy.

"Yes. Well… kind of." Percy answered.

"That's not a very assuring answer, Perseus." Thalia growled taking a step forward, signaling that she wasn't afraid to attack.

"Hang on now, let me finish!" Percy protested. "I think I know where he's going. Or at least, someone who does."

"Nico hardly tells anyone anything about his whereabouts." Annabeth reminded Percy. "The only one he's close enough to tell where he's off to is…" She trailed off, knowing exactly whom Nico would tell.

"Get your purple shirts and dog tags." Percy instructed. "We're headed to Jupiter."

* * *

><p><em>Boy did I hit a major dry spell. I literally couldn't think of ANYTHING to write about for WEEKS. I was just sitting in my room, playing Skyrim, thinking about writing. And yet, I couldn't! Nothing came to mind! Weirdly enough, this chapter came to me after watching hilariously amazing Bollywood film by the name of Om Shanti Om. You should check it out. Also, next chapter wraps up Thalico. BUT, we're not done. Oh no, we're never done. Next, Malcolm get's a story line! <em>


	22. Chapter 21

**Chapter 21: Annabeth Goes on a Nico Hunt **

"Mammaaa! Life had just begun! Come on now sing it with me Piper!"

"I don't know the rest of the song, so no I can't sing it with you." Piper responded to Jason, who was in an unusually good mood. It was a lovely day at Jupiter. There were no wars or Titans to fight, the sun was shining, New Rome was coming along brilliantly with the Greek section now that Reyna had lightened up, and Piper was sitting next to him on top of the hill that overlooked the camp, looking as pretty as ever.

"How do you not know Bohemian Rhapsody?" Jason asked, genuinely surprised.

"It's not that I don't, I just don't know all of the lyrics." Piper said, shrugging. "But I do know bicycle race."

Jason nodded. "Oh yeah I like that one. I want to ride my bicycle!"

"I want to ride my bike!" Piper continued.

"I want to ride my-"

"JASON!" Jason stopped singing as a loud voice calling his name snapped him out of song.

"Who could that be?" Piper asked, turning in the same direction Jason had to see who was calling.

"Jason! Jason there you are!" Percy called as he came bolting up the hill.

"Percy? Something wrong?" Jason asked standing up. Though he was disappointed his perfect afternoon with Piper had been interrupted, he knew Percy wouldn't be bolting as fast as he could up the hill yelling his name for no reason.

"Where's Hazel?" Percy asked, out of breath, as he stopped a few feet in front of Jason.

"I'm not sure, something wrong?" Jason asked.

"No, well… yes… no… well ok kind of…" Percy stammered, trying to make sense of the situation in his head. "Nico's run off again, and Hazel would be the only one who would know where to find him."

"Why do you need to find Nico?" Piper asked, standing up. "Doesn't he leave every other day?"

"This time is different!" Percy interrupted. "He and Thalia have some unfinished business to take care of."

"Thalia!" Now Jason was on high alert. Anyone who messed with his sister messed with him too. "What did that punk do to her?"

"Nothing, uh, yet anyways." Percy answered.

"Wait. This doesn't have to do with their date, does it?" Piper asked. Jason turned around to give her an expression that let her know he had no idea what was going on.

"Date? She can't date! She's a hunter!" Jason said, sounding just as confused as he looked.

"Jason, let's go look for Hazel and I'll explain everything." Percy said, putting his had on Jason's shoulder and leading him down to Jupiter.

Meanwhile, on the other side of camp, Annabeth and Thalia were on their own search for Hazel.

"Why on earth is this camp so big?" Thalia asked, exasperated and deeply annoyed. Half-Blood, though large and vast, was only half the size of Jupiter, and Jupiter was taking a long time to search through to find one camper out almost hundreds.

"They have more year round campers than us." Annabeth responded. "Not to mention and entire city to take care of."

"She could be anywhere!" Thalia whined. "And so could Nico at this point, the little snot."

"He's as old as you are." Annabeth reminded her. "Don't talk about him like he's ten. Or that you don't like him."

"I have the right to be mad at him you know." Thalia grumbled and turned red as they continued to walk the line of cabins.

"I know. We'll find him." Annabeth said, trying to be comforting.

"Is that a bear?" Thalia asked, no longer listening. Annabeth looked back at the path down the cabins, and lying in the sun on the porch of the fifth one was indeed a large grizzly bear.

"No, I think that's…" Annabeth trailed off as she realized who it was. "Frank! Frank wake up!" Annabeth bolted up the porch steps and nudged the bear with her foot. "Frank I need you to pay attention."

Frank's bear body quickly shifted back into that of his own as he looked up and Annabeth blearily. "This is the only time I have for napping." He groaned. "Oh! Annabeth I didn't know it was you!" He exclaimed as he clamored to his feet and stood at attention. "What's up?"

"Where's Hazel?" Annabeth asked. If anyone knew where she was, it was Frank.

"Hazel? What time is it?" Frank asked.

"It's around one." Annabeth answered impatiently.

"Oh, then she is more than likely in the forge." Frank answered.

"The forge? Why is she in there?" Thalia asked. Normally, only Vulcan's children were found in the forges, not a daughter of Pluto.

"She can summon metal from the ground, remember?" Frank reminded them.

"Right, doesn't matter, let's go Annabeth." Thalia said, shoving Annabeth back down the stairs.

"Thank you Frank!" Annabeth called back before Thalia had pushed her farther down the line.

"Yeah, sure, you're welcome." Frank called back before changing back into a bear for more sleep.

Annabeth led the two of them to a large, low ceilinged cabin that stood right outside the weapon storage. Smoke billowed out of a large smoke stack in the ceiling, and a fire could be seen through the open front door.

Annabeth stepped inside first.

"Yes, hello I'll be right with you." A voice from behind a large wielding masked answered, as he hammered away at something long and glowing. "Oh! Annabeth didn't see you there." The figure, which was rather large and built more like an Ox than a person, pulled the mask off reveling a head of curly dark hair, and a very well chiseled face framed by two bushy muttonchops.

"Hello Bruce." Annabeth greeted the son of Vulcan. Bruce was the head weapon forger at Jupiter, and had been for four years after he had turned 18. Vulcans and Hephaestians didn't vary much between Greek and Romans, as both sets of children usually were built strong and solid with dark hair and tanner skin.

"We're looking for Hazel. You seen her?" Thalia interrupted once more.

"You called?" Another voice came from behind fire pit. Hazel appeared, wearing a blacksmith apron and a set of gloves, but otherwise looked the same.

"We're in a bit of a jam here. Would you mind stepping out for a second and helping us?" Annabeth asked, trying to take charge so Thalia wouldn't word-vomit all over Hazel and cause a commotion.

"Yes, no problem. I'll be right back, ok Bruce?" Hazel asked her cohort, who had gone back to hammering a glowing piece of metal. Bruce nodded and waved her on. The trio stepped out into the light of Jupiter and sat on the porch of the forge. "What seems to be the problem?"

"We're having a bit of a problem with Nico." Annabeth started.

"He owes me a favor or six hundred." Thalia interrupted, annoyed.

"But he's once again left camp." Annabeth continued. "Now normally I would let him do his own thing. He seems to do just fine on his own, but this time things are a little… complicated."

"Complicated? How so? Nico doesn't usually like to cause conflict." Hazel said, shaking her head.

"Well ok, let me try and explain." Annabeth said, trying to think of a way to explain the situation without going into full on confusing detail. However, Thalia had a different plan.

"Nico and I went on a date that went rather well. But in case you were wondering, I got a weeks pass from Artemis from the Hunters to try this out to make sure it wasn't something serious like I'm in love with him or something, and so I took him up on the date, and we had fun. So I quit the hunters today, but not really because of Nico, but kind of, but not really because I probably would have anyways, and then Nico left town because the hunters got mad at Annabeth because they thought she was trying to get me to quit for her own gain, and he feels like he's caused too much trouble. That and I ran away for a night." Thalia spilled out, not stopping to breathe.

"What she means to say," Annabeth put a hand on Thalia's shoulder to let her know she had said enough, "is that Nico needs to come back to Half-Blood to talk this all out."

Hazel nodded, taking in everything that had just been dumped upon her. "Whoo boy, that is complicated." She said, once again shaking her head. "I can see how he does need to come back and sort things out."

"Great! You'll tell us where he is then?" Thalia asked, seeming happier than she had been in days.

"I would if I knew where he was." Hazel said with a sheepish shrug. "But he didn't even tell me he was leaving. I assumed he was still at Half-Blood."

"What!" Thalia slumped onto Annabeth's shoulder and buried her head into her arms. "This is ridiculous!"

"It sure sounds like it." Hazel agreed. "I can help look for him, if you'd like." She offered.

"Thanks, Hazel, but until we get a lead on where he is, searching won't do much good." Annabeth answered.

"Miss Chase." A voice from behind Annabeth made her instantly regret her trip to Jupiter. She turned around, and there was Reyna, wearing a surprisingly normal outfit of dark jean shorts and a purple camp shirt, with her two metallic hounds. "I hear you're having a problem with one of your campers."

"Reyna, I appreciate your concern but I really must be looking for said camper as opposed to hearing about how I need to keep a better eye on them." Annabeth answered, standing up to meet Reyna's eyes.

"I wasn't coming over here to berate you. I know Nico too, you know. I came to find you because knowing Nico, he hasn't gone far." Reyna explained.

"How did you even know it was Nico?" Annabeth asked.

"Oh gods… whooo boy… she's fast." Percy came speeding around the corner, followed by Jason and Piper, who were all equally out of breath.

"She can help!" Jason pointed to Reyna. "Her hounds are excellent trackers."

"And she's agreed to help! Even better!" Piper chimed in, looking excited. Annabeth knew that as much as she would hate to admit it, Piper was still a sucker for a good romance story, and would not be missing an opportunity to bring Thalia and Nico together.

"Unless you know where he is, Hazel." Percy said to Hazel as he looked over at her.

Hazel shook her head. "Haven't the slightest clue. He didn't come to me to even tell me his was leaving."

"Did he leave from Half-Blood?" Reyna asked.

"More than likely." Percy answered. "If you could follow us, that would be great."

Reyna nodded, and smiled. "Alright, no use staying here then. Let's get a move on."

The group consisting of Jason, Percy, Piper, Annabeth, Reyna, and Thalia made it back to Half-Blood, and stood at Thalia's tree.

"This is really the only place he could have left from unless he's an unusually good swimmer or wants to hike through several miles of woods." Percy explained.

"Alright," Reyna said nodding, "Give me something with his scent."

"Here," Thalia handed Reyna Nico's hat, the one he had worn into New York. "I found it in his cabin."

"Perfect." Reyna tossed the hat to the hounds, who set to sniffing it ferociously. "Alright, go boys." The hounds obeyed immediately as they began tracking a trail down the hill and off the campus.

"We should follow them, yeah?" Jason asked. Reyna nodded. "Alright, let's go." Jason commanded as he took off down the hill after the hounds, Piper, Percy and Thalia in tow.

"Hang on, you stay for a second." Reyna stopped Annabeth before she had a chance to follow the group after the dogs. "I wanted to talk to you."

"About?" Annabeth asked, skeptical.

"It was wrong of me to try and break up your relationship for my own gain." Reyna said. "I'm not exactly fond of things not going my way."

"Hubris?" Annabeth asked, belonging in the same boat.

Reyna looked at her sideways. "How do you…"

Annabeth pointed at herself with both thumbs. "I'm the queen of it on the east coast." She answered.

"Let's walk." Reyna said, gesturing her down the hill where the group and the hounds were trotting off into the distance. "I don't really like Percy the way you do."

"Then why chase after him?" Annabeth asked, confused.

"Because he's different." Reyna answered.

"Every guy is different." Annabeth retorted.

Reyna shook her head. "All the Roman guys act the same. All tough and strait forward with little room for emotions. Sure, I mean some of them differ from person to person, but the mentality is still there."

"And that's bad because?" Annabeth asked. In her studies, that's exactly the kind of thing Romans found appealing.

"Because it means that most of them aren't exactly great for a stable relationship with someone who is just as headstrong as they are." Reyna explained. "But Percy isn't like that, which made him appealing. I felt as though it would be easy to have a relationship with him because he could handle someone who doesn't like being bossed around."

"That's why ours works." Annabeth answered.

"Yeah, exactly. That's why you two are a perfect match." Reyna agreed. "And I get that. He's not mine, he never was. And truth be told, I never wanted him to be mine. I just wanted someone like him." Reyna explained. "And besides, I think I may have found someone better."

Before Annabeth could ask who, a voice rang from the bottom of the hill. "HURRY UP BEFORE I DRAG YOU!" Thalia screamed up the hill, as apparently Reyna and Annabeth were being too slow.

"Is she ok?" Reyna asked, looking at Annabeth concerned.

"Love does weird things to people." Annabeth answered with a smile.

"Aye. That it does." Reyna agreed.

* * *

><p><em>This should tied you guys over for a while. I lied... NEXT chapter wraps up Thalico. Anyways, I'll be gone for almost three weeks with NO computer, as I'll be in Europe. Great for me, not so great for you guys. But, once I get back, updates will resume. So just hang in there! <em>


	23. Chapter 22

**Chapter 22: Annabeth meets Dr. Tran and Has an Acid Trip with Muppets**

Annabeth and Reyna had taken off running after the group, the trail the hounds had taken being surprisingly strait forward. It was as if Nico had just run to the road leading to Half-Blood as opposed to trying to throw everyone off by either shadow traveling or taking a Pegasus. Either the group had hit a very lucky streak with finding Nico's trail, or Nico wasn't exactly planning on staying gone long.

"You'd think Nico would be a little more subtle than this." Percy mentioned exactly what Annabeth was thinking as they followed the dogs.

"I was thinking the exact same thing." She answered. "I mean, why didn't he just shadow travel or take one of his skeleton horses?"

"Thankfully he didn't, or else my hounds would be of no use." Reyna responded, walking a few feet in front of the group.

"Where did you get these two, by the way?" Piper asked.

"They were already at camp as a gift from Lupa, but they didn't respond well to anyone and were causing more trouble for the animal care givers than they were worth. So, I took them in and we've been one big happy family ever since." Reyna explained.

"No seriously, it's like Nico wants to be found." Jason interrupted, agreeing with Percy.

Suddenly, the dogs stopped and whined as if they had lost the scent. "I think we stand corrected." Percy groaned. They had reached the road, with no trace of anyone in site.

"No! No no no no! It's not like he could have just up and dis a fucking peared!" Thalia whined.

"No, I don't think he disappeared, Thalia." Reyna said.

"I think he hitched a ride." Annabeth finished.

"He what?" Piper whined, obviously not caring to hide her disappointment in how the search was turning out.

"Guys! Car!" Jason called as a car was approaching. The group, as if all connected onto the same wavelength, jumped in the bushes all at once. It was weird enough that there was a group of teens just standing around on a road to nowhere, let alone a group of teens with two metallic dogs looking like they were some sort of dysfunctional Scooby gang. Maybe the mist would take care of the dogs, but they were still a bunch of misfits standing in the middle of nowhere.

The car drove at a medium speed, and Annabeth was sure that it would pass them like any other car. However, the care actually slowed down as it approached the bushes. Her heart stopped. Had the car spotted them? Was it holding monsters in disguise? Would she have to attack?

To her surprise and relief, none of those things happened. However, to her even greater surprise, Nico jumped out of the back seat.

"Thanks Argus. I'll see you at camp." Nico said as he continued to walk up the path. Annabeth felt it best not to surprise him, but Thalia had a different idea.

"NICO YOU ASSFACE!" Thalia yelled as she exploded out of the bushes.

Nico had already pulled his sword out in fright before Annabeth followed Thalia and grabbed her around the waist to keep her from charging him.

"Dear lord woman! Scare me to death why don't you!" He gasped, looking like a deer in the headlights.

"How could you possibly leave?" Thalia yelled again, trying to break free from Annabeth's grip and succeeding.

"Thalia calm down!" Annabeth urged as she fell to her knees from lack of balance as Thalia ripped from her arms like an angry cat.

"Do you realize how much shit you put me through?" Thalia asked Nico angrily.

"Why do you think I left?" Nico asked defensively.

"That only made things worse!" Thalia argued back.

"Should we leave them to work it out or stay in case they kill each other?" Piper whispered to Annabeth as she helped her to her feet.

"I'm having the same debate in my head right as we speak." Annabeth answered.

"Look, Thalia. I like you, I do. But if this is going to cause the next civil war between Hunters and Half-Blood, I don't want all of this to turn into some sort of sick version of Romeo and Juliet minus the puffy shirts and poetic dialog." Nico reasoned.

"Forget the hunters, Nico! I quit anyways so it's not like that matters." Thalia responded.

Nico froze, stunned. "What?"

"I said I quit." Thalia repeated. "And not just because of you, just so you know. I mean yes, you started that train of thought, but I probably would have quit anyways."

"Why?" Nico asked, still stunned.

"Because they were filling in the hole for a family I already had here at Half-Blood. As much as I love the Hunters, I got in for the wrong reasons and I think we can all agree that since everything has become stable between the camps, Jason and I will be able to live pretty normal lives." Thalia explained, and then realized she was getting off track and shook her head. "That being said, maybe it's time you thought about doing the same."

"We should go." Annabeth whispered to the group behind her once she realized how emotional this conversation might get.

"Yeah, ok." Percy nodded, gesturing the group back up the hill.

"So they're not going to kill each other then?" Reyna asked, looking back at the two of them.

"We can only hope." Annabeth said, sighing.

Once back at Half-Blood, Jason and Reyna decided to stick around for the afternoon and hang out, but Annabeth went back to her cabin to take a nap. The nectar was starting to ware off, and the fatigue and congestion crept back into her system.

"I think I need to go lay down." Annabeth said to Percy as they meandered back into the circle of cabins.

"If you need anything, call." Percy said giving her a smile.

"I'm going to play fetch with Ms. O'Leary." Jason said excitedly as he darted off towards the direction of the arena, Piper in tow. It was amusing how much of a kid Jason could be when not tasked with anything.

"And I'm going to pay someone a visit." Reyna mentioned nonchalantly as she walked off towards the shop class.

"And I'm going to bed." Annabeth groaned.

Unfortunately, when she opened her cabin door, peace was not exactly too be found.

"Dr. Tran! He's the world's greatest action hero!" The computer screen that Ariadne and August were both giggling like hyenas at roared.

"Oh lord." Annabeth groaned.

"Hey Annabeth!" August looked up from the screen. "Have you witnessed Doctor Tran?"

"No, and right now I don't want to." Annabeth responded, collapsing down onto her bunk face first. "Don't you two have a class to be in?"

"I'm in a class right now." August said as the computer mentioned something about a hot dicking.

"Technically I'm supposed to be teaching her about Greek myths and culture." Ariadne answered with an eye roll.

"But Doctor Tran is more fun." August finished with a smile.

Annabeth stared at the two of them, silently cursing Ariadne for being so lax in lesson plans. Knowing full and well that they weren't going to be leaving any time soon Annabeth walked over to the bunk and slumped against Ariadne as she stared at the screen. "Alright, what are we watching?" Annabeth grumbled. If they weren't going to leave, she might as well join them.

"Only the greatest action hero of all time!" August answered. "Doctor Tran."

August rewound the video, and in no time Annabeth was greeted with a bemused looking, tiny, Asian kid and a screaming narrator that may or may not have been the product of a satanic ritual sacrifice gone wrong over a botched movie trailer.

"He once killed his own mother with a chainsaw TO THE FAAAACEE!" The narrator roared as Tran protested to no avail.

"Please no!" The young Tran begged, "My mother is fine!"

"Ok, I'm missing something." Annabeth said, both horrified and amused all at the same time.

"Actually, you're not really." August said with a shrug.

"August is kind of right. Doctor Tran is that kid, and the narrator is probably some sort of horrifying demon god that decided to rip his life into shreds of insanity. Other than that, there is nothing to get." Ariadne explained. "It's very entertaining."

"That poor kid." Annabeth said as sympathetically as she could through laughter.

"Call now, and you'll receive the Doctor Tran 30,000 DVD collection!" The narrator continued.

"He'd have to make 100 movies every day for eight years." Ariadne calculated.

"This is like watching someone slowly go insane, and yet being allowed to laugh at it." Annabeth commented, still giggling.

"Wait, this one is the best one!" August wiped the tears of mirth from her eyes and typed in another name into the YouTube bar. When she clicked on the link, Annabeth was greeted to a new scene with Dr. Tran, only this time he was eating ice-cream in a car between an old lady and a boy with a head shaped like a hard candy.

"What on earth is that?" Annabeth asked, not sure if she should be terrified or amused.

"That's Leeland the cough drop." August responded.

"A cough drop?" Annabeth deadpanned. "I'm sicker than I thought."

"How would you two like it if every Wednesday, I picked you up from school for ice-cream and a quick trip to the toy store?" The grandma on the right asked.

"TOY STOOORE!" Leeland screamed in response.

"This can only end badly." Annabeth once again deadpanned.

Again, she was right. The grandma had devolved into insanity pretty quickly, running over children, talking about getting raped by domestic cats, running over a slew of disable orphans, and then afterwards bailing out of the car all together, only to have the car roll to a stop right in front of the toy store.

"August, I'm not sure how to respond." Ariadne said, though she was laughing.

"That's kind of the point." August said, an almost evil smile on her face.

"Well August, you truly are a weirdo." Annabeth commented, patting August on the shoulder.

"Not weird enough. Not yet. I've got one more thing you have to see." August said, still smiling mischievously.

"Is it slenderman?" Annabeth asked, not willing to subject herself to more horrors.

"No, just as creepy though." August answered. She typed in one final sentence into the search bar. _Don't Hug Me I'm Scared_.

Annabeth expected a video of apocalyptic proportions, but what appeared on the screen was nothing more than a bunch of ill put together muppets, and an anthropomorphic note pad. Then, the notepad started singing about being creative.

"I feel like I'm watching a bad indie film." Ariadne commented. "This is just shitty as opposed to terrifying."

"It gets worse." August said, still smiling like a maniac.

And indeed it did. The farther it went along, the more demented and horrific the video got, until it met an unfortunate end with all the creatures eating a cake stuffed with entrails and playing with a human heart.

"Good lord, August. Where do you find this stuff?" Ariadne asked, no longer smiling and looking more like she may puke.

"Will." August answered simply.

"Good to know the weirdness runs in the family." Annabeth said, now really feeling like she needed a nap.

KNOCK KNOCK KNOCK

"Who's that?" August asked out loud, getting up and answering the door.

"You two, out." Thalia instructed both August and Ariadne. "I need to speak to Annabeth."

"Whatever." August said with a shrug, walking out of the door. "See you two later. Ariadne and I have to go knowledge together or something anyways."

"I feel sick." Ariadne groaned, getting off the bed and walking out behind August. "You're a terrible person, Augustine."

"What happened?" Thalia asked, motioning towards the computer screen as Ariadne let the door close behind her.

"The muppets all took acid." Annabeth said, closing the laptop and moving it onto her trunk. "What's the news?"

"The bad news is that all of the hunters kind of hate me now. But the good news is that I'm no longer single." Thalia said sheepishly.

"Well one of these things is good at least." Annabeth said with a smile.

"Turns out he left to go buy me this!" Thalia held up a new shirt with the pony Rainbow Dash on it that read "20% Cooler."

"Aw I totally want that shirt." Annabeth commented, rolling onto her stomach.

"You don't look so hot." Thalia said, walking over to Annabeth and feeling her forehead.

"I don't feel great." Annabeth said while clearing her throat. "I think the nectar is starting to wear off."

"You should take a nap." Thalia suggested.

"Yeah that's not a bad idea." Annabeth answered, getting under the covers and rolling over.

"I'll wake you for dinner." Thalia said, walking towards the door. "Oh but one more thing."

"Yes?" Annabeth rolled over to look at Thalia, who had an interesting look on her face, as if calculating what to say next.

"Have you seen your brother lately?" Thalia asked.

Annabeth shrugged. "Which one?"

"Malcolm. You know, I'd ask him about what he does with his free time if I were you." Thalia once again suggested as she walked out the door.

"Wait, come back! What?" Annabeth called after her, but Thalia wasn't answering. "Just what I needed." Annabeth croaked. "More problems." And with that, sleep won the battle.

* * *

><p><em>And I back from Europe! It was totally awesome. So, here's what happens when Annabeth watched Dr. Tran. And also, Thalico will now simmer down from now on, and won't be a main plot line, but I've got another one coming in soon so watch out!<br>Now, next on the agenda is a FanFic challenge! After seeing the "How To Train Your Dragon" Arena Spectacular, and being in love with the movie since day one, I got to thinking about how bad ass both Astrid from HTTYD and Annabeth both are. So my challenge, should you choose to accept it, is to write a cross over VERSUS fic between Astrid and Annabeth. I have only three rules:  
>1. It must be an evenly matched battle. You can't have Astrid with five dragons and an arsenal of Viking weaponry and Annabeth in her PJs or Annabeth and the entirety of Half-Blood and Jupiter with Astrid left with her axe. Both sides must have equal armies and weaponry, though what they have at their disposal is your choice. It could be a simple fist fight, or a full fledged war. <em>  
>2. <em>How you chose to start, begin and end it and how the plot unfolds is completely up to you, but you may not add in any other fandoms. That is to say Doctor Who can't come in at the last hour and save the day.<br>3. This is not a challenge where I chose a winner, just a challenge for the fun of it. If you want me to read it, send the link along in a message! _  
><em>Welp, that's all for now! I'll see you guys in a about a week! Tata! <em>


	24. Chapter 23

**Chapter 23: Annabeth Meets an Invader and The World of Flash Games**

Annabeth woke up from her nap not feeling any better, but thankfully not any worse. Dinner went by in a cold medicine infused haze, and afterward she decided to skip out on any sort of war games in favor of more rest. She'd find some other time to talk to Malcolm, but at the moment her head was too clouded over with a mixture of sinus meds and mucus to deal with more problems.

So there she was collapsed back onto her bunk, staring at the far wall because she was too tired to do anything else, but too drugged to fall asleep.

KNOCK KNOCK "Annabeth, are you in there?" Percy's voice came from behind the cabin door.

"Hmmm." Annabeth grunted in response.

Percy stepped inside and sat down next to her on her bunk and felt her forehead. "Wow, you don't look good at all, and you're burning up." He commented, looking worried.

"Thank you captain obvious." Annabeth croaked, turning away from him.

"You know, maybe it wouldn't be a bad idea for you to stay in my cabin tonight." Percy suggested stroking the hair out of Annabeth's face.

"Why?" Annabeth asked, not seeing the logic. "I'd just get you sick, and it's not like I'm in any sort of mood to be romantic."

"I'm not trying to be romantic here. I mean, think of it this way. Would you rather get me sick, or an entire cabin of campers?" Percy asked.

Annabeth paused, and then sighed. "That's not a bad point."

"Alrighty, great! Get what you need, and I'll carry you out." Percy said with a smile.

The best part about Percy's cabin was the fact that it was more of a small house than a cabin. He had one half set up like a living room, complete with a couch, TV, mini fridge, and coffee table, and the other half was the bedroom with the bed and bookshelf. Not that the bookshelf held anything remotely educational; mostly DVDs and videogames with the occasional comic book strewn in. The only real literature on the shelves was the Lord of the Rings trilogy, Harry Potter, and whatever books Annabeth had told him to read.

The home like feel to the cabin already made Annabeth feel a little bit better as she sat up in the bed next to Percy watching their mutually favorite movie, Troy.

"I wonder if I like this movie so much because we live it, or because it just happens to be really bad ass." Percy mused as Brad Pitt once again proceeded to unleash a can of hurt onto his enemies.

"Both maybe?" Annabeth shrugged. "I just like watching Brad Pitt." She joked, and then proceeded into another coughing fit.

"Ah, see? Aphrodite will get you." Percy joked back, handing her the mug of chamomile tea she had been sipping on to soothe her throat.

"Shut up." She groaned, slumping back down.

Suddenly, the DVD began to skip and glitch out, rendering the scene unreadable.

"Oh man, I should have never lent that DVD to Connor." Percy griped, standing up and ejecting the DVD from his PS3 that was hooked up to his TV. "You don't hold it by the actual disk."

"Can you clean it?" Annabeth asked, sitting back up again, miffed that the DVD had chosen to cut out just at the climax.

"He scratched it!" Percy whined. "How on earth did he manage to scratch it that deep?"

"That sucks." Annabeth sympathized.

"Thankfully I have another copy at home, but I'll have to wait until next weekend to get it from my house." Percy grumbled. He sighed and went back to the bookshelf, looking through his DVD collection. "Are you tired?"

"The Dayquil is still attempting to work itself out of my system." Annabeth answered, still feeling a little wired. "So no."

"Alright well I've got a bunch of stuff here." Percy said, running his fingers across the spines of the DVD cases.

"I watched almost all of those movies with you." Annabeth reminded him. "What else you got?"

"I have a bunch of TV show box sets." Percy responded, moving to the shelf just below the movies. "Arrested development…"

"Seen it." Annabeth cut off.

"Scrubs…"

"Yeah, that too."

"United States of Tara…"

"Not a big fan."

"True blood…"

"You own DVD's of True Blood?" Annabeth asked flatly. She knew Percy was a weirdo, but didn't expect him to be a vampire nut.

"You read Twilight and admitted that the books were compelling. Don't judge me." He shot back.

"What else do you have?" Annabeth continued, turning red. She was sure that she would never see the end of her Twilight confession.

"Ok I've got the first season of House, all of Jackass…"

"Seriously?"

"I'm a guy! Cut me some slack!" Percy griped. "Walking Dead, South Park, Invader Zim, 30 Rock…"

"Wait what?" Annabeth cut him off again. "Go back."

"30 Rock?" Percy pointed to the DVD case.

"No the one before that." Annabeth sat up and moved him aside. "This one. Invader Zim."

"Oh yeah. It's kind of a bizarre little cartoon. Think Adventure Time by Tim Burton." Percy explained, taking the DVD box off the shelf. "It's funny though."

"My little brothers love Adventure Time." Annabeth said as she took the DVD box from Percy. "And I can't say I hate Adventure Time either."

"I don't know if you'll like Invader Zim or not." Percy said, giving Annabeth a pensive look. "But hey, worth a shot."

He took out the first DVD in the set and popped it into the PS3, the title select screen popping up.

"I can tell already that you were right about this being bizarre." Annabeth commented, watching Percy select the pilot episode.

Annabeth had always been a fan of animation. There was something about taking art and giving it life that fascinated her. Then again, Athena was technically the goddess of art. Invader Zim was, in her eyes, something of a site to behold. The animation was not pretty, but it wasn't supposed to be. The characters didn't move like normal living creatures, and the entire thing looked like it took place in a future where Blade Runner and Disney Land collided.

"As weird as this sounds, I love this." Annabeth said, completely enthralled in the series by the third episode.

"Wow, really?" Percy asked, surprised. Annabeth had a descent sense of humor, and could share in a laugh over something stupid now and then, but Annabeth wasn't one to ere on the side of weird.

"It's so weird that it's kind of broken through to another side of normal in it's own universe." Annabeth tried to explain, pausing the DVD. "Let me put it this way. There is no way that this show will ever have a normal moment in it, but it's not like it's trying to. And that's why it's awesome."

"Huh, never thought about it that way." Percy agreed, nodding his head. "Ok, unpause it. This is the best part!" He said as he took the controller and pressed play.

"MY SQUEEZIN' ARM! THEY TOOK MY SQUEEZIN' ARM!" The robot dad screamed melodramatically as his robot arm flopped and squirmed around on the floor like a severed lizard tail.

"Well that's… uh…" Annabeth was at a loss for words.

"Yeah this episode is pretty crazy, and that's saying something." Percy commented as the robot parent decoys proceeded to river stomp in the middle of a parent teacher night.

"I like how it's apparently a running theme that no one notices, or cares, that wherever Zim goes, weird things happen." Annabeth said, lying back onto the bed.

"The later episodes kind of take that theme to the extreme." Percy said. "Tired yet?"

"Yeah…" Annabeth answered softly as she flipped onto her stomach and closed her eyes. "Maybe I'll feel better in the morning."

"Let's hope so." Percy said turning off the PS3 and flicking off the lights. He got back into bed, wrapping one arm around Annabeth as they both drifted off to sleep.

Annabeth woke up to an empty bed, but a note where Percy should have been next to her.

_Take an extra day to recover. I've got your defense classes covered, and Ariadne and Malcolm are covering your history lessons. Feel free you use whatever you want. _

_-Percy. _

"I'm sick of being sick." Annabeth griped to herself, only feeling marginally better than she had yesterday. She swung her legs around and stood up, stretching the sleep away. The day was a rainy one out in the real world, though Half-Blood remained dry, albeit gloomy.

She looked back over towards the TV, where the Invader Zim box set was left on top of the PS3. "Well, I'm not doing anything today anyways." She sighed, grabbing the controller.

Annabeth started where she had left off. This episode was about Dib and Zim turning into giant bologna sausages, which she found just as weird as it sounded.

"I'm so confused." Annabeth whispered to herself as she stared at the screen wide-eyed and unable to look away.

"Yeah that's kind of the point." Another voice said, startling Annabeth and causing her to jump. "Sorry," Thalia apologized as she stepped all the way through the door, Nico following in suite. "Still not feeling well?"

"I'm pretty sure Apollo is turning a blind eye to this illness." Annabeth complained, slumping back against the backboard of the bed.

"Well look on the bright said," Nico said, sitting on the bed Indian style, "you don't have to teach any classes until you get better."

"True, but then again I'd rather teach a class than feel awful for two days in a row." Annabeth answered.

"Well we're here to make it better!" Thalia said with a smile, holding Nico's laptop over her head like Link from Zelda.

"Please be careful." Nico begged, not wanting to see his new laptop destroyed within the first few weeks of use.

"Oh please, Nico. You know as well as I do that- oops!" Thalia faked dropping the computer, causing Nico to almost have a heart attack.

"That's it, you've lost your laptop touching privileges." Nico said, attempting to get his laptop out of Thalia's grip. To Annabeth's surprise though, he was smiling. Nico, prince of eternal damned and darkness, was smiling.

"Ok, fine take it." Thalia surrendered. Annabeth couldn't deny that they did indeed make a cute couple.

"Ok, what are you torturing me with today?" Annabeth asked, Nico situating himself so the screen faced all three of them.

"So I was hanging out with Leo and Jason yesterday while Reyna was-" Nico was cut off by Thalia elbowing him in the ribs. "Er… right. Not supposed to bring that up just yet."

"Wait what?" Annabeth asked, curiosity burning.

"Nothing. Anyways, I was hanging with Jason and Leo online for a while. Leo figured out how to hook up the computer to the big screen in the bunker, and we ended up finding this flash game." Nico explained, pointing to the screen.

"Happy meals?" Annabeth said, her sickness and dyslexia making the brightly lit LED screen look like almost complete gibberish.

"No, Happy Wheels." Thalia pointed out. "The best game ever."

"See, watch." Nico directed Annabeth's attention back towards the screen where a man on a bike with his infant son on the back stood ready at the start of a track.

"This won't end well, will it?" Annabeth asked.

"No." Thalia giggled.

"Oh gods." Annabeth groaned.

Nico started the pair of bicyclists down the track, and all was going fine until harpoon guns began appearing out of the ground and impaling the bikers.

"Wait what?" Annabeth asked flatly.

"Yep." Nico responded. "There are millions of tracks like this too."

"Wait… is that Santa?" Annabeth asked, watching a new track where Santa was piloting his sled, which was now being dragged by elves as opposed to reindeer, through a minefield.

"There's much more than just Santa." Thalia smiled evilly. "There's wheel chair man, shopping cart lady, Vespa couple, Segway driver, psycho dad and son…"

"This game is demented." Annabeth cut off as she watched Nico proceed to run down hundreds of people with a giant hammer.

"Yep, that it is." Nico answered, not caring about the fact that his character had just lost all of his limbs and was now just a floating torso with a head on a sled. This went on for several minutes, Annabeth feeling just as confused as ever, until Thalia had another idea.

"Oooh! We should show her Slender!" Thalia suggested, bouncing with excitement.

"Ooh! No you shouldn't!" Annabeth mimickingly disagreed, having learned her lesson about Slender Man with her brother and sister.

"Too bad, so sad." Thalia refuted. "Gimme." She moved the laptop onto her lap, and typed in Slender into Google. "Nico, kill the lights."

"Nico, do as I say and leave the lights ON." Annabeth demanded, adding extra emphasis to "on."

"Last time I checked," Nico said with a sly streak in his voice as he flipped the light switch, "I wasn't dating you." He waved his hand, all the blinds pulling themselves shut at his princely order, which made the cabin impossibly dark with the combination of the outside world's gloominess and the fact that Percy's cabin faced the northern lake, not the eastern side of camp where the sun could easily shine in.

"Ok, and here we go." Thalia said as she typed in the words 'slender game' into Google, and clicked the link.

The game started off in the woods, with the scene set in a first person setting.

"What's the object of the game?" Annabeth asked, watching as Thalia walked around the woods.

"You have to find all eight pages of this journal." Nico explained. "It's essentially a scavenger hunt, only you go insane."

"Comforting." Annabeth groaned as Thalia found the first page. The game continued, with Thalia finding the second, then third page. Finally, something happened.

"You know, being in an abandoned house in the middle of nowhere is just begging for something horrible to happen." Nico pointed out.

"Again, kind of the point." Thalia said. Suddenly, just as she turned around, there it was.

"WHATISTHAT?" Annabeth squealed, Slenderman standing in the doorway of the building.

"Calm down!" Nico begged, his hands flying up to his ears. "Jeez, you can handle monsters off all sorts and yet a guy in a suit is what freaks you out?"

"Nico, I don't think you understand just how scaring Slenderman is." Thalia pointed out, started to shake herself.

"You see, Nico, Slenderman is scary because he's so… ominous." Annabeth pointed out, hiding behind Thalia and glancing over her shoulder.

"Ominous, sure, whatever you s- OHGODSRUN!" Nico yelled as soon as Slenderman popped up out of nowhere from behind a tree.

"SEE! I'm not crazy!" Thalia agreed, almost having jumped out of her skin.

"I'm opening the blinds back up." Annabeth said, not taking no for an answer.

"Yeah… yeah do that." Thalia said in a small voice.

Annabeth got up and walked over to the window closest to the bed and yanked open the blinds. What she saw, she didn't expect.

"What's Reyna still doing here?" Annabeth asked, looking out towards the Athena cabin, where Reyna was sitting on the porch.

"She's still here?" Nico asked, craning his neck for a look.

"Yeah, and she's sitting on my porch." Annabeth responded. Then, Malcolm walked out from the cabin, and sat next to her. "Wait… no."

"What?" Thalia asked, also curious.

Annabeth, having gained function back after what she just witnessed, answered. "My brother just kissed Reyna."

* * *

><p><em>So, guys, I think I owe you an explanation about my current bout of long delays. I guess I have to come clean at some point, so here it goes. I'm currently undergoing treatment for my anxiety disorder, and part of that disorder is lack of focus and motivation. Because of that, it has been increasingly difficult for me to keep these updates coming on a regular basis. Thankfully, I'm currently undergoing a new treatment which seems to be helping me be more productive and lively, so I should be back on track with these updates and other such things in the coming weeks. Thanks for sticking with me! <em>


	25. Chapter 24

**Chapter 24: Annabeth Becomes a Starkid**

"You both knew, and neither of you bothered to tell me!" Annabeth squealed, pacing back and forth as Nico and Thalia watched her in fear that if they said anything wrong, they'd lose a life.

"Malcolm told us that he either wanted you to come to him, or for him to tell you personally." Thalia explained, raising her hands in surrender.

"So how long have they been, well, together?" Annabeth asked, still not sure she liked the idea of her brother dating her ex-rival.

"I guess a week or so." Nico said, looking sheepish. "Give or take."

"What?!" Annabeth once again squealed.

"Hey, don't get mad at me!" Thalia answered defensively. "I only found out about this yesterday because of Nico."

"And I only found out about it three days ago because of Hazel." Nico continued. "And she only knew because of Frank."

"And how did Frank know?" Annabeth asked, unsure of when the chain would end.

"I think Malcolm told him directly." Nico answered. "Anyways, Malcolm didn't want to stir up any more bad blood between the two of you, so he neglected to tell you until you had made peace with Reyna."

"Jeez, how did they even meet?" Annabeth asked, flopping back down on the bed.

"When Malcolm took over for you during your ban from New Rome." Nico once again answered. "So I guess one good thing came from you duking it out with Reyna."

"Wait, she was still on the designer board and I wasn't?" Annabeth sat up, looking positively livid.

"No, she was also banned from New Rome." Nico continued. "They met because she was snooping around with the plans late one night when she shouldn't have been."

"This is too weird." Annabeth shook her head. "I've got to go talk to him."

"Give the guy a break, Anna. This could be good for both of them!" Thalia argued, watching Annabeth grab her sneakers and shove them on.

"How?" Annabeth retorted.

"Well, ok, let's see…" Thalia bit her lip in thought, having obviously not come up with a solid answer.

"Thalia is right," Nico interjected, taking the heat off of Thalia, "Reyna will probably keep Malcolm's slacker tendencies in check, and Malcolm may keep Reyna's alpha attitude at bay."

"That's… not a bad point actually." Annabeth agreed, surprised at herself. "Regardless, I'm going back to my cabin to get some fresh clothes."

"And I'm going to introduce Happy Wheels to the Aphrodite cabin." Thalia said with a sadistic smile.

"And I should probably follow her." Nico said, standing up and walking behind Thalia, who was holding Nico's laptop over her head in victory.

"Please don't cause them any emotional harm." Annabeth begged.

"We won't! Promise!" Thalia called as she stepped off the porch. Annabeth heard Nico's protest as Thalia ran off, laptop still in hand.

Annabeth blew her nose once more before exiting the cabin, and walked back to the Athena cabin. Once inside, she saw Malcolm was putting on his set of armor.

"You have a class to teach or something?" Annabeth asked. Malcolm's classes didn't start until after lunch usually, with Annabeth taking up the morning slots of the schedule and some of Ares' campers filling in the evening.

"Taking over one your self defense classes today." Malcolm answered, brushing his short, curly blond hair out of his face. If no one knew any better, they could easily mistake Annabeth and Malcolm for twins despite the year age difference between the two.

"That's nice of you, but I thought Percy had mine covered." Annabeth said, walking over to her trunk and picking out a set of clothes for the day.

"He had the first one, but I decided to take the second one for him, give him a break. You two do a lot for this camp," Malcolm continued, adjusting the last strap on his chest plate, "so I figure it'd be nice to give you both a break every now and then as well."

Annabeth drifted into a silence for a few moments, contemplating what to say next. "So… you and Reyna…" She trailed off, not sure how to continue the conversation without getting awkward.

"Ah, I was wondering when you'd catch on." Malcolm answered nonchalantly, like it wasn't a big deal.

"Why didn't you mention it?" Annabeth asked from behind her cabin's changing curtain. She had gotten so used to talking to her siblings, or her siblings talking to her while getting undressed on the fly, that even serious topics like strategy and relationships were no longer considered taboo to talk about while changing clothes.

"Didn't want to freak you out." Malcolm answered, again, nonchalantly.

Annabeth gave a short, curt, laugh. "What makes you think I'd freak-"

"Beth, I know you better than you think." Malcolm cut her off. "Reyna and I started dating the day after your big fight between the two of you. I didn't think it would be right for me to waltz right in that night and be all like 'totally dating Reyna, your arch rival.'"

Annabeth nodded to herself, seeing the logic, and shoved a Half-Blood t-shirt over her head. "How did you two meet, exactly?"

"I was going back to the drafting room to lock up the blue prints for the evening and found her in there. We got to talking, one thing lead to another, and she kind of won me over by the time I had to leave." Malcolm sighed, though it was more in exasperation than in a romantic sense. "Turns out we fit together pretty well."

"That's unexpected." Annabeth responded sarcastically. She pulled on some jean shorts and stepped out from behind the curtain, looking at her brother quizzically. "Is she nice?" Annabeth finally asked.

"To me she is." Malcolm said with a shrug. "And I guess that's what matters."

"Gods what does she see in you?" Annabeth teased, unable to keep a strait face.

"Haha, so funny." Malcolm growled, poking her hard in the stomach, causing Annabeth to squeak in pain. "I'll have you know that it's becoming pretty common place for Roman chicks to find Greek guys like me very attractive."

"Why?" Annabeth asked, still holding one hand over her stomach.

"Because apparently, and I quote from another unrelated Roman girl who isn't Reyna, we're 'sensitive and artsy.'" He said, using air quotes. "Now I've got to teach your class. I'll be back in an hour."

"Alright, thanks again." Annabeth playfully punched him in the shoulder on the way out. Stuck in her own cabin with nothing better to do than to read or study, Annabeth pulled her favorite Harry Potter book off the shelf and slumped back down onto her bunk.

**PARROT HATTERS AND THE GIBLET OF FRIES**

Annabeth rubbed her eyes with her fingers, the title page popping out at her incoherently. Normally, she could override her dyslexia fairly easily by reading whole words as opposed to individual letters that make up a word, making reading awkward yet bearable. Today, however, with the combination of being sick and still sleepy from the shot of Nyquil she had done to get to sleep last night, her dyslexia wasn't giving her much peace.

"What does that even say?" She grumbled to herself, tossing the book to the floor and staring up at the ceiling.

"It says Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire." Ariadne answered, standing in the doorway.

Annabeth looked up at her sister. "Does your dyslexia get worse when you're sick?" She asked her.

"Depends on what kind of sick." Ariadne responded, sitting on the foot of Annabeth's bed Indian style. "It wasn't terrible when I caught mono, but I could barely read soup can labels when I had strep."

"How did you catch mono?" Annabeth teased with a half-smile.

Ariadne rolled her eyes, but still turned slightly pink. "It wasn't from THAT." She protested. "I caught it at a dance last year when I set my drink down." She explained defensively.

"Don't you have a class to teach?" Annabeth asked her sister.

"It's supposed to be my morning tutoring session with August," Ariadne answered, her expression going almost angry, "but…"

"But?" Annabeth coaxed.

"But August might have gotten into trouble this morning." Ariadne finished with a pained expression.

"For?" Annabeth asked, looking at Ariadne for more of an explanation.

"Long story." Ariadne sighed, looking to the side.

"It's fairly obvious that I have nothing better to do today." Annabeth retorted, waving at her to go on.

"Well ok. One of the Hephaestus boys, Luis, you know him right?" Ariadne asked.

"Yeah, I think so. The shrimpy one with the red hair right?" Annabeth confirmed.

Ariadne nodded and continued. "Well I was walking past the forge with August on our way to the armory, and Luis was leaning against his cabin. Well long story short, he catcalled me followed by a fairly lewd statement about my butt, and August right hooked him without question."

"Whoa! Is he ok?" Annabeth asked, more worried for Luis's sake than August's punishment.

"He will be. Nectar fixed him up pretty well, so he'll just have a bad bruise for a few days." Ariadne rolled her eyes again before continuing. "August, however, has three days of stable and kitchen duty."

"Do you think she sees you as more than just a friend?" Annabeth asked with a cocked eyebrow. Ever since a week and a half ago when August first showed up to camp, the two of them had been inseparable, with August becoming very over protective.

Ariadne turned beet red and began to study a very interesting spot on the bed. "I… no… I mean… no she doesn't!" She stammered, "We're just friends."

"Sure," Annabeth said nodding disbelievingly, "just friends. Got it."

"Yeah, friends." Ariadne once again protested, regaining composure.

"Yeah, ok." Annabeth once again responded, still not convinced.

"Have you ever seen a Very Potter Musical?" Ariadne asked, desperate to change the subject.

"Can't say I have." Annabeth answered, giving her sister a break.

"Well if you can't read Harry Potter today," Ariadne answered, gesturing towards Annabeth's laptop, "at least you can watch people make it awesome."

Annabeth handed the laptop over, which Ariadne promptly opened up and began typing. "So, I pretty much figure you've heard about Malcolm."

"Yep." Annabeth nodded. "Go figure."

"Maybe she'll whip him into shape." Ariadne suggested, hitting enter on YouTube.

"Lets hope." Annabeth groaned. "Why is everyone suddenly so interested in romance lately!"

"Anna, seriously, where do you think you are?" Ariadne gave her an obvious look, but Annabeth shook her head, not catching on. "You're at a camp where the average age is fourteen, it's co-ed, and due to divine lineage, the ration of hot people to not hot people makes this place a living breathing movie set. What do you think is going to happen?" Ariadne asked.

"Good point." Annabeth nodded. "What are we watching?" She asked, Ariadne scooting next to her so they could both see the screen.

"You know Daren Criss from Glee?" Ariadne asked.

"More or less." Annabeth answered.

"Well before he got his breakout role, he started a theatre troop with his college friends called Team Starkid. They've done some pretty crazy plays, but A Very Potter Musical is probably their most well know." Ariadne pressed play, the title screen popping up with an ominous guitar playing the first five or so notes to the Harry Potter theme. "And here we go."

_"__Underneath these stairs__, __I hear the sneers and feel glares of__ m__y cousin, my uncle and my aunt." _The Daren Criss, playing a young Harry Potter sang.

The videos went on, each segment of the play funnier than the last.

"_Did someone say Draco Malfoy?" _The Draco character proclaimed as his actress rolled across the floor.

"This is the best thing I've ever seen." Annabeth remarked, not looking away from the screen.

"There's also a sequel." Ariadne said with a smile.

Annabeth turned and looked at her, wide eyed. "Well, I know what I'm doing all day." Annabeth said, high fiving her sister.

"It's really easy to get addicted to these plays." Ariadne said as she clicked on the next part.

"How many do they have?" Annabeth asked, amazed that a group of college kids could conjure up entire plays in a matter of months.

"Several." Ariadne scrolled down the list. "There's Little White Lie, Me and My Dick, Starship_…" _

"What did you just say?" Annabeth cut her off.

"Yep, they have a play called Me and My Dick. I'm not making that up." Ariadne said flatly, pointing to the screen. "And yes, it is awesome."

"What class do you have next?" Annabeth asked, looking at Ariadne with a sly expression.

"It's my swim period. Why?" Ariadne responded.

"Who teaches that?" Annabeth continued.

"Uh… Percy?" Ariadne answered, still not catching on.

"Let's say your cramps started acting up." Annabeth suggested.

"But I'm not on my… oh." Ariadne nodded, the idea suddenly dawning on her. "Yeah, my cramps. Right." She smiled, leaning back against the bed.

"Next part! I want to see how they defeat Voldemort!" Annabeth demanded, snapping her fingers.

"I'm on it!" Ariadne agreed.

* * *

><p><em>Look who's back on somewhat of a schedule! I feel great, and that means more chapters are coming down the pipe! So, my next question is would anyone be willing to draw me some cover art for this story? Because if you did, they're might be talks of a cameo appearance by you or your OC in future chapters. Just a suggestion! Thanks guys! <em>


	26. Chapter 25

**Chapter 25: Annabeth Faces Full Life Consequences Against a Certain Group of Ponies **

Two hours later, Ariadne and Annabeth hadn't moved from their previous spots on Annabeth's bed.

"We should try and be productive at some point today." Ariadne suggested.

"Yeah, we should." Annabeth nodded. Then the two of them simultaneously erupted into laughter.

"Alright lazy bones," Malcolm chided as he entered the cabin and pointed a sword at the younger of the two sisters, "you have no excuse. Get off you butt and come to sword practice."

"Alright fine." Ariadne rolled her eyes and got up from the bed. "I'll be back. Don't start anything without me."

"Fine." Annabeth said exasperatedly. No sooner had Ariadne and Malcolm walked out of the cabin, her phone buzzed.

"Yer a Half Life fan right?" Will asked.

"Yeah. Y?" Annabeth answered. Her little brothers back home had abandoned the game half way through, calling it too weird and boring, leaving her with the copy. She found it enjoyable, and had since beaten it twice.

"U kno g-mod?" He asked.

"Kind of." She answered. Again, it had been floating around Malcolm and Percy's Tumblr. She knew it was where gamers went into the mechanics of the game and created bootleg modifications, but knew little else.

"Go look up Full Life Consequences on YouTube." Will instructed.

"Okay fine then." Annabeth mumbled to herself, having no intent of moving from her bed at this point. Her fingers quickly typed into the youtube search bar, then retyped, then retyped yet again. "Ok, I don't care if I can read Greek fluently like some sort of ancient scholar. Dyslexia sucks." She grumbled.

Finally, she managed to type in the correct name and clicked on the link.

A poorly animated version of the characters from Half-Life and from Team Fortress 2 popped up, their physics not exactly reacting the way normal people's do. In fact, not in the slightest.

_"One day, John Freeman, brother of Gordon Freeman, was an office." _The almost robotic narrator said as the video game character typed poorly at his computer.

"Oh gods this is bizarre." Annabeth once again whispered to herself, not exactly sure what was going on.

_"John Freeman ran up to the roof where he left his normal people __**close **__and his motorcycle." _The narrator continued.

"That's just a giant bathtub with wheels." Annabeth pointed out to no one.

The video progressed from there, failing to make any sense what so ever. Once she finished it, Annabeth had questions.

"Will, wtf did you just send me too?" She texted, surprised that it came out as clear as it did.

"its a fanfiction that someone set to gmod." He texted back.

"I dont know how to correctly respond." She text, rubbing her eyes afterward out of confusion. She sighed and stood up, stretching. She no longer felt sick, but had no intent of going back to the real world any time soon, and flopped back down on the bed.

Her lazy afternoon was quickly thwarted by a distant rumbled.

"Is that…" She trailed off, hoping she was wrong.

"ANNABETH!" Percy's voice ripped through the noise as he jumped up onto the porch and shot through the cabin door. "They're back!" He exclaimed, his eyes wide with worry.

"Who's back?" Annabeth asked just as the sound in the distance got loud enough for her to distinguish. "No…" Her eyes became just as big as Percy's as soon as she realized just who had arrived.

_Clop clop clop clop. _The sound grew louder.

"Does Chiron know?" Annabeth asked, quickly standing up and rushing over to Percy to get a look outside.

_CLOP CLOP CLOP! _Louder still.

"He's the one who told me!" Percy answered as he and Annabeth rushed off the porch towards the big house.

_**CLOP CLOP CLOP! **_The noise was right behind the hill now.

Campers all over were spilling out of their cabins, buildings, and from the woods upon hearing the colossal noise approaching.

"What is that?" Some of the younger campers asked in a muddled tone as they all walked out and stared at the big hill.

"Man the stations! Everyone get to high ground and brace yourself!" Clarisse called over the crowd, trying to get everyone to snap out of their confusion, horror, excitement, or all of the above to pay attention.

"You heard the lady, get moving!" Chris agreed, roaring over the crowd.

"Out of all the times they could have made an appearance," Travis started, standing next to his brother outside of their cabin waiting for a show,

"This is the most unexpected." Connor finished, hi fiving his twin.

"Annabeth! You hear that?" Thalia called from behind Nico, who was tugging on her arm to keep them both moving back to his cabin for safety.

"How can I not?" Annabeth answered, looking around at the chaos that was starting to happen once everyone realized just what was going on.

"Councilors!" Malcolm yelled, having mounted his Pegasus so he could be seen and heard better, "get your campers inside! Prepare for conflict!" He took off towards the hill, leaving a cloud of dust behind him.

"Oh gods oh gods not now!" Ariadne whimpered as she came sprinting back into the cabin, slamming the door behind her, only to open it back up as August came barreling in after her.

"You've yet to tell me what's going on, but if you're running from it I know it can't be good!" August whined, looking outside the cabin window at the distant thundering sound.

"It's the pffftttyyy pnnnnszzzz!" Ariadne's muffled voice called from the attic of the cabin, obviously not wanting any part of this.

"The what?" August asked again.

"**PAAARRRTTTYYYY POOOOOONNIIIIIEEEEESSSS! WHOOOOOOO!**" The unanimous cry came screaming down the hill as the dozens upon dozens of Centaurs came spilling into the camp. Their t-shirts all read "Party Ponies: The _ Chapter", several chapters being represented from New York, to Florida, all the way to California and Texas.

"That's awesome!" August exclaimed, almost sprinting past Percy to greet the new Centaurs, only to be thrown over Percy's shoulder and carried back inside. "Hey!" August protested, wriggling out of Percy's grip.

"August, I know that those Centaurs look cool, but trust me, you want know part in it." Percy explained as August gave him a confused look.

"Sorry to interrupt." Reyna apologized as she came stumbling inside the Athena cabin. "It was the closest cabin to the armory."

"No, please come inside. You don't want to be out there." Annabeth nodded, gesturing Reyna up to the attic where Ariadne was currently in hiding. "Where did Malcolm go?"

"Last I saw him was when he took off towards the hill." Reyna answered. "I may be a war goddesses daughter, but I want no part in whatever THAT is." She pointed outside with a look of disgust. Annabeth didn't blame her; wars were strategized and required practice and thought in order to win. Party Ponies did the exact opposite.

"What are those guys anyways?" August asked, being first up the ladder.

"How much Centaur lore do you know?" Reyna asked, following August up the ladder. Annabeth and Percy followed in tow.

"I know Chiron is one." August answered, running to the attic window as she watched the scene on the ground unfold. Centaurs continued to flood into the camp, campers either running for cover or attempting to talk the centaurs out of their chaos from on top of cabins or directly in the crowd, only to either be tossed aside or go unheard. It looked more like a war scene than a party.

"Centaurs are known for their reckless behavior." Annabeth continued.

"Exactly. Chiron is a very, VERY, rare exception to that." Reyna followed. "Most of the time, they look like this."

"Has this happened before?" Percy asked, looking almost panicked as his camp was being trashed.

"Once." Annabeth answered, toying with a bead on her Half-Blood necklace. It was the one with Centaur in a prom dress. "Well, since I've been here anyways."

"You know, you never explained that bead to me." Percy turned to look at her, a look of needing and explanation on his face.

Annabeth sighed and rolled her eyes. "I was ten when it happened. They rolled into camp, just like they are doing right now, and ended up desecrating almost everything. They stayed for two weeks, because no matter what we tried, we couldn't get them to leave. It was only when we destroyed their root beer supply did they finally decide to go home." She explained. "Pretty much everyone who was around for that summer got some pretty messed up beads for that one."

"Why can't we, you know, do that again?" Ariadne asked like it was obvious.

"You want to go out there right as their getting warmed up?" Annabeth pointed outside.

Ariadne looked at the ground and shook her head.

"I do!" August exclaimed, running from the window towards the attic exit.

She was stopped short as Ariadne tackled her to the ground. "What are you, crazy?" Ariadne asked, having straddled August and pinned her to the ground so she couldn't get back up and do something brash.

"I can handle chaotic energy!" August protested as she wrestled Ariadne off of her and attempted to make her way to the exit. "I've been to a number of rock concerts."

"This is far from a rock concert." Reyna interjected, grabbing August's arm and pulling her away from the door. "This is an orgy of insanity."

"Well if no one else is going to stop them," August defied, breaking free from Reyna's grip and ducking underneath Ariadne's next tackle as she fled down the ladder, "then I guess I have to!" She called as the cabin door could be heard slamming behind her.

"Gods be damned is she insane?" Ariadne squealed as she chased after her.

"I'm not leaving them out there alone." Percy followed, determined to keep everyone safe.

"I'm coming to!" Annabeth finalized, not wanting to be left out.

"Annabeth," Percy pushed her back away from the ladder, his eyes filled with pleading, "please just for once stay behind!"

She was a little shocked at his response to her wanting to come, and decided for once to just swallow her pride and listen to him. "Ok, fine." She whispered back. He nodded and ran back down the ladder, the door slamming behind him as he shoved his way out.

Annnabeth turned back towards Reyna. "Aren't you going?" She asked, bemused as to why Reyna hadn't been out there in the first place.

"Are you dense?" Reyna asked like Annabeth had just asked her to a flaming sword swallowing challenge.

"Malcolm, Percy, and a number of our friends and cohorts are out there!" Annabeth responded, taken aback by Reyna's statement.

"Annabeth, have you any clue about wild centaurs?" Renya asked, still looking at Annabeth like she was crazy.

"Well, sure!" Annabeth said like it was obvious, "I mean from what Chiron has told me, they tend to get a little crazy but-"

"Have you yourself ever picked up a book on centaurs?" Reyna cut her off, eyebrow cocked.

"I've read about them in various compiled tomes but not looked into them specifically." Annabeth shrugged. Greek centaurs weren't vicious monsters, and Chiron had done an excellent job of explaining their lore to her, which meant that she had no reason to look further into them. "What's the big deal?"

"Annabeth, please sit down for a few minutes and listen." Reyna gestured to the rug that had been placed in the attic for sitting and reading during rainy days. Annabeth didn't argue as she sat down opposite Reyna. Her tone was so level and so serious that Annabeth was almost compelled to sit down. "Look, I don't know what they teach you at this camp, especially considering your mentor is a centaur himself, but in the Roman camp one of the first creatures we're taught about is the Centaur."

"Why?" Annabeth asked, now thoroughly confused.

Reyna sighed before continuing, almost like the topic was about to get awkward. "Centaurs are reckless beasts that follow no orders but their own, or the orders that promise hefty rewards. They literally have no boundaries. Now these centaurs may be partiers, but there's no reason to say that they won't arson this camp after their done with it and loot everything before leaving. It's impossible to fight something that unpredictable."

"Oh…" Annabeth sighed, looking at the ground. She had known Centaurs to be crazy and reckless, but had refused to believe that they were so callous and self absorbed, mostly due to the fact that her surrogate father happened to be one of them.

"I'd rather wait until they settle before jumping into anything that may get us killed." Reyna explained.

"And they're outnumbering us dozens to one." Annabeth trailed off, the very idea that Chiron was related to creatures that would act so vile making her stomach tie itself into a knot.

"Exactly, Annabeth. Now do you see why I don't want to be out there?" Reyna asked, looking at Annabeth, again, like it was obvious.

"Look, I get that Roman centaurs must be dangerous, but, I mean, these guys must be harmless!" Annabeth reassured, more to herself than to Reyna.

"Are they?" Reyna asked, more serious than rhetorical, though her voice had elements of both.

"Well I've never seen them do anything completely barbaric." Annabeth once again trailed off as she looked out the window, the crowd of centaurs not anywhere near subsiding as the loud speaker began to blast the most horrid of 80's music.

"Doesn't mean they won't." Reyna said.

Annabeth closed her eyes and bit back the urge to go defend her camp, but ultimately failed when images of her younger sister flashed into her head. "I have to go find my sister." She said as she stood up and bolted towards the attic exit.

"You're not going out there alone!" Reyna protested. "If you're going out there, you're going to at least need back up." She said with a sly smile.

"Reyna," Annabeth said as she smiled back and extended her hand, "I think we're going to get along just fine."

* * *

><p><em>...these next few chapters are going to get kind of weird... just a heads up. <em>


	27. Chapter 26

**Chapter 26: Annabeth Finds Out that Video Games are SRS BSNSS**

Annabeth and Reyna charged through the crowd of campers and Centaurs, both of them narrowly avoiding swinging limbs, root beer bottles, hooves, and other flying pieces of debris as they made their way through the crowd. The problem Annabeth was facing now was who exactly she was looking for. Should she look for Percy in hopes that he had found her sister and others to help defend the camp? Or look for Malcolm in order to strategize and come up with a plan? Or maybe she should forgo looking for campers at the moment and attempt to find the leader of the Party Ponies.

"Annabeth, do you have a plan?" Reyna asked from beside her, looking just as confused.

"Several, but I don't think any of them are going to be of any," she ducked right before a root beer bottle could hit her, "help! You have anything?"

"I'd say we get reinforcements from Rome!" Reyna suggested, ducking under a strait buck from a particularly large centaur.

"That's not a bad idea, but the portal can't handle that many people going through all at once!" Annabeth called back as she jumped onto the porch of Hermes' cabin just before a trio of the horsemen could trample her.

"It's stable enough! We've got to try!" Reyna argued next to her.

Right before Annabeth was about to agree, Chiron's voice boomed louder than the entire chaotic scene.

"**EEENNOOUUGGGHH!" **His voice carried throughout the whole camp. Everything suddenly stopped, like someone had just hit pause on a movie.

"I had no idea he could do that." Reyna whispered, looking stunned.

"I had almost forgotten myself." Annabeth whispered back, having only heard Chiron yell like that once before, and in the same situation.

"Everyone who is not a centaur, get back to your cabins IMMEDIATELY." Chiron demanded. Most campers, especially the new and younger ones, scampered off the scene and into their respective cabins. The only campers remaining were either older councilors or those who had been too stunned to move.

"As for the Party Ponies," Chiron looked around, his dark eyes burning holes into his brethren, "if you are not off the premises in thirty minutes, I'm sending in Roman reinforcements and you all will suffer consequences."

"Whoa whoa whoa!" A voice with a heavy Brooklyn accent interjected. It's owner, a large, portly, black-coated centaur with a slick hair due akin to a 50's mobster stepped forward in challenge. "Chiron, buddy, you said yourself that Half-Blood was a safe haven for the Party Ponies too am I right boys?" The centaur crowd erupted into another round of cheering, only to be silenced by a hand wave from the greasy centaur.

"I said safe haven, Eurytion. Not animal house!" Chiron stepped forward, face to face with the leader of the Party Ponies. "Now get out or I will be forced to use drastic measures."

"Now Chiron, this is no way to treat family." Eurytion cooed.

"That's Eurytion?" Percy asked as he stumbled unto the Hermes' porch, looking slightly bruised but no worse for wear. "Dang, he really let himself go since his bout with Heracles."

"I'll say." Annabeth agreed, watching the confrontation carefully. If war was going to break out, she wanted to be ready.

"You're telling me how to treat family?" Chiron exclaimed, gesturing to the war zone that the camp had almost been reduced to. "What do you call you're grand entrance then?"

"A party, obviously!" Eurytion responded with glee, his centaur cohorts once again erupting into cheers.

Chiron put a hand over his face, obviously exasperated with the way things were going. "Eurytion, brother, what will it take for all of you to _leave_?" Chiron asked, the last word coming out more like a bullet.

"Leave so soon?" Eurytion asked sarcastically. Chiron's burning look gave him his answer. "Alright fine, we'll go."

Chiron sighed in relief. "Splendid! Take your things and…"

"Uh-uh. Not so fast." Eurytion cut him off. "We'll leave on one condition."

"No! No conditions! Get out!" Chiron finalized, looking unhappier every second.

"Look, if you don't agree, we're gonna stay and we're going to paarrtaayy!" Eurytion gestured to the crowd, who all agreed happily.

"Ok! Ok, fine! What condition?" Chiron asked, now desperate.

"Let's hold a contest!" Eurytion suggested, putting an arm around Chiron's shoulder, much to the wiser centaur's disgust. "You pick three of your finest campers, they win whatever challenge I think of, we leave and go bother the Roman camp!"

"WHAT?!" Reyna yelled, not taking any of that. "No! By my authority, I refuse to let you do that!" She challenged, stepping off the porch and drawing her dagger.

"And who the hell are you?" Eurytion asked, crossing his arms over his massive chest.

"I am Reyna of New Rome. I am the head Praetor of camp Jupiter, and I will protect my camp from the likes of any of you." She pointed her dagger at the greasy horseman to punctuate her sentence.

Eurytion chuckled and stroked his hair back uneasily, looking like he was trying to hide his obvious uneasiness towards Reyna. "Alright, alright. No need to get snippy now. We wouldn't invade Jupiter anyways. Too staunch."

"Whatever." Reyna growled, sheathing her dagger.

"There's still a matter of the challenge." Chiron reminded Eurytion.

"Oh, yeah." Eurytion looked to the left, realizing at least part of his own stupidity. Suddenly, an idea dawned on him. "Hey! You're all young and hip!"

"Eurytion," Chiron interjected, "what does that have to do with…"

"Who's up for a round of Team Fortress Two?" Eurytion yelled, his centaurs agreeing. "Now we need your volunteers, Chiron."

Annabeth's impulsivity got the best of her before she could stop herself. "I VOLUNTEER!"

All eyes were suddenly on her, which normally wouldn't have been a huge deal to her had she not just volunteered herself in what was essentially a glorified Xbox match. "I uh… volunteer." She stammered out, turning bright red.

"Me! ME! ME ME ME! Me too!" Malcolm called out from on top of Demeter's roof, sliding down and running towards Chiron. "I also volunteer!"

"And me!" Leo interjected. "I volunteer as tribute!"

"Great! That settles your little group!" Eurytion cheered as he clapped his hands together. "Who wants to volunteer for the centaurs!" Again, more cheering.

"You what?" Percy whispered to Annabeth as the centaurs bickered amongst each other.

"Percy, trust me, I'm really good at this game." Annabeth reassured him. It was true; she was very good at Team Fortress 2. She just kept in under wraps, considering the fact that she technically wasn't supposed to be using the Athenian work laptop for video games.

_**POP **_

A blinding light flickered behind the cabins, making both Percy and Annabeth turn in its direction.

"Wait! Hold on!" A familiar voice called out. A very regal voice. "No, no, no, and no!"

"M-mom?" Annabeth asked in disbelief as Athena herself made her way through the crowd. She looked very regal in her golden toga and floral crown, though her expression was that of absolute anger and disbelief.

"My lady!" Chiron kneeled before her. "This visit is…"

"Unexpected. I'm aware." She finished for him. She took a deep breath before continuing. "I've stood by whilst this camp has descended into madness due to your shall we say, gifts, Chiron." She gave the centaur a less than pleased look. "I myself am a firm believer in taking breaks to enjoy some personal free time with the arts and what have you, but it's gone too far! I've watched as many of the campers slacked off on their duties to goof around with friends on the internet as opposed to taking measures to defend themselves. But again, this is the first summer in a very long time that any of your campers have had a break from wars. And I've let it slide again and again, hoping that things would get back on track soon enough.

"But this!" Athena gestured to the Eurytion with disdain. "Letting your campers settle scores through video games?"

"My lady, this is not as bad as it looks." Chiron tried to reason, backing up a tad in order to make himself not as sure a shot in Athena's fists' reign of fire, should she chose to go ninja on his hindquarters.

"Not as bad!" Athena certainly wasn't having that. "Chiron, you just allowed the fate of this camp to be decided by a Valve game!"

"She knows about Valve?" Percy asked in disbelief.

"Knows about it?" Annabeth looked at Percy with a proud look. "Percy, the founder, Mike Harrington, is her son."

"It's a way to get them to settle their dispute without bloodshed." Chiron protested, no longer seeming afraid.

"Bloodshed? Chiron, this is Camp Half-Blood." Athena gestured to the sign. "This camp is about bloodshed."

"Look, Athy, we've got our volunteers and our game picked out! Let's let the kid play!" Eurytion protested. The camp went silent.

Athena turned towards the greaser slowly, her grey eyes literally crackling like lightning. "Call me Athy again and I will break off your legs individually and force feed them to you. Those you won't eat will go in the other end." She threatened, grabbing his hand and squeezing. The crunch could be heard from where Annabeth, Percy, and Reyna were still standing, several yards away. All three of them winced.

Eurytion went pale and whimpered, kneeling before her, bowing his head. "Ok, ok, sorry. Yes my lady. I'm sorry." He sniveled.

"Well it looks like you're certainly not going to be playing now anyways." She said condescendingly. "Malcolm," She turned towards her son (who looked like a deer in the headlights), "get your warriors ready and have them escort these heathens out of camp."

Malcolm bowed before mounting his Pegasus again. "Yes mother."

"Hey wait a minute, we made a deal!" Another centaur spoke up. "They either follow through or we stay!" Once again, the crowd roared in agreement.

"TEE EFF TWO TEE EFF TWO!" The centaurs chanted.

Athena took a deep breath, obviously still fuming and trying not to desecrate the herd with a flick of her wrist. She turned towards the Hermes' porch and nodded Annabeth over, who came running.

"Yes, mom?" She asked. Ever since last summer, she was on high alert not to make her mother angry at her for any reason.

"How good would you say you are at Team Fortress?" She asked, giving Annabeth a quizzical look.

"I've pretty much won matches single handedly." Annabeth answered truthfully. Normally, her hubris would have taken over and she would have proudly announced her stats and her kill to death ratio, but something in the back of her head told her that wasting time on a video game was not something to boast about to your mother.

"I'm assuming Malcolm is on par?" Athena asked. Annabeth nodded. "And with Leo on board this match shouldn't take more than a few minutes." She mused.

"Oh no. You're not actually thinking about going through with this are you?" Annabeth asked, looking back at Eurytion, who in turn was still fuming and holding his hand.

"They're obviously not leaving without force or Team Fortress. I'm leaving it up to you. You can either organize your troops and drive them out of here, or we can play them and hope for the best. It's your call." Athena crossed her arms and nodded, waiting for Annabeth to answer.

"What would you have me do?" She asked her mother, looking between the rowdy centaurs and the frightened campers.

"You know I'm not allowed to persuade you one way or another. I've already broken enough rules just by showing up. It's your call." Athena reminded her, remaining stoic as to not show favoritism to either suggestion.

"If you can't beat them," Annabeth grumbled to herself watching the centaurs continue to get riled up, "join them."

"Fine." Chiron sighed exasperatedly. "We accept your challenge! Leo, get the game set up!" He commanded. The centaurs all roared with glee.

Annabeth turned back towards her mother, who looked displeased. "After that entire speech I gave. Really?"

"I'd rather not cause this camp to get destroyed over root beer and 80's rock music. This is the safer bet." She explained.

Athena rolled her eyes. "Very well. Good luck." And with that, she disappeared behind the cabins, and with a loud pop, she was gone.

"You sure you know what you're doing?" Percy asked as he ran up next to Annabeth.

"At this point, I'm not sure anyone knows what to do." Annabeth answered.

"Regardless," Reyna interjected as they made their way to Bunker 9, "things are about to get interesting."

* * *

><p><em>It was either Team Fortress or Pokemon, but I'm saving Pokemon for a later chapter. Meowth that's right! <em>


	28. Chapter 27

**Chapter 27: Annabeth Plays for Keeps**

"Are you absolutely sure this is the only way?" Percy asked as Leo set up the dual TV screens and Xboxes for the match in Bunker 9. Even he was having a hard time coming to terms with what was happening.

"No. There are thousands of other ways this could have gone down." Annabeth responded, adjusting her gaming headset. "This is the only way to go without having something get physically destroyed."

"Right, well we can't exactly count on that not happening either." Malcolm casually stated as he rolled his wrists and cracked his knuckles. Annabeth was happy to have her brother on her team. If anyone knew his way around team gaming, it was Malcolm.

"I don't think something like this could ever happen in Jupiter." Reyna stepped in, also looking a little bemused as to just how this was happening.

"And that's why our camp is awesome!" Thalia responded, standing behind Annabeth as she sat cross-legged on the couch.

"Exactly. If you're not kicking monster butt, you're duking it out with Xboxes. We're an entirely logical society." Nico half sarcastically agreed from the swivel chair in the corner of the room. Thalia winked at him, and he winked back. Annabeth's jaw almost dropped; Thalia and Nico weren't supposed to be romantic.

"Hey guys," Leo interjected, finishing up the hook up, "what if after all this is over, they still don't leave."

"Simple. We'll give the Ares cabin all they can drink Monster energy and let them have unlimited weapon access." Malcolm joked.

"You know," Thalia said with a pensive expression, "we could win so many more battles that way."

"Gods where are they?" Nico asked, looking at little paranoid and irked all at the same time.

"WHOOOO!" The yelling could be heard from several yards away as the Ponies' chosen players made their approach.

"Speak of the devils." Nyssa deadpanned from her seat at the poker table where she had previously been losing to Connor and Travis.

"Hey, hey, hey!" Eurytion greeted everyone as he and his two cronies entered the bunker. Everyone looked up, not amused. Apparently, his hand had healed enough to where he would be joining in. "Well don't all get too excited." He grumbled.

"Let's just get this over with." Annabeth groaned, starting to regret her decisions.

"Right." Percy stood up and took a gold coin out of his jean pocket. "Ponies, call your side."

"Tails!" The cream coated surfer looking horseman barked before anyone else could respond.

Percy flipped the coin in the air, and caught it in his hand before slapping on the back on his other one. "Tails it is. Ponies get red team."

There was an audible groan from the Half-Blood campers.

"So why is that bad, exactly?" Reyna quietly asked Malcolm.

"It's a notorious in-joke amongst Team Fortress players that red team always wins." He grumbled in response. "Alright, enough talk. Pick your player."

"I call scout." Annabeth demanded, selecting the baseball bat armed character.

"Engineer." Leo called out.

"And I'll take sniper." Malcolm finalized.

Annabeth looked over to her left where the ponies had taken their seats, only to see them still bickering over who played who. Eventually, they all ended up picking Pyros.

"Balanced." Malcolm said sarcastically.

"Good for us then." Leo smiled evilly.

"Or not." Connor disagreed.

"Brings a whole knew meaning to the term 'kill it with fire.'" Travis agreed with his twin.

"Alright we're on a private server, which means it's three against three. The game is capture the briefcase. First one to do so wins. Only one match." Percy explained briefly as he stood behind both groups. "Enter the match."

"We're either screwed or unbelievably lucky." Leo concluded as they all spawned into their respective areas.

"Go!" Percy instructed as everyone took off.

"Leo, I need you to start building tripods at all of the weak locations." Malcolm instructed.

"On it!" Leo agreed, already building turrets at warp speed.

"A few health points and ammo dispensers while you're at it." Malcolm added.

"Gotcha." Leo nodded.

"Ok, Annabeth I need…" Before Malcolm could finish, Annabeth had already blown two out of three pyros to oblivion.

"Need what?" She asked as she jumped onto a wall and ran off before the third Pyro could catch up or respond.

"Nothing. I apparently don't need to tell you shit." Malcolm said with a chuckle.

"Hey! What the hell!" One of the ponies exclaimed as his character proceeded to once again get annihilated by a spray of bullets.

"Oh crap I'm dyin' over here!" Eurytion complained as Malcolm took his pyro out from on top a building, unseen to the other players.

"I'm outta ammo dude!" The surfer pony whined as Annabeth's scout made a beeline towards his character, cracking his skull with a baseball bat.

"Wait for more to spawn!" Eurytion yelled as Leo's turrets gunned his character down as he got too close to it's hidden location. "Awww c'mon!"

"They're not exactly good at this." Thalia whispered to Annabeth as she went searching for the briefcase in Red team's building.

"Something tells me they've only ever played each other." Annabeth responded as another pyro can speeding at her, only to be taken out with a precise head shot delivered from Malcolm's sniper.

"You're welcome!" He said enthusiastically.

"Ah, there we are." Annabeth said more to herself than anyone as she infiltrated the red team base and located the briefcase. "Malcolm, cover for me. I'm going in."

"On it. Leo, shot gun time bro!" Malcolm instructed as he and Leo high fived.

"Woot!" Leo agreed excitedly. In no time, Malcolm and Leo had taken down all three of the opposing team's members while Annabeth returned the briefcase to her team's base, thus winning the match in under ten minutes.

"WHAT THE FUUUUCK?" Eurytion roared as he hurled his controller at the wall, the plastic shattering to bits.

"Bro that's totally not cool!" The surfer pony whined, punching the sofa in anger.

"You cheated! That's cheating!" The third pony with the dreadlocks accused.

"I don't recall strategy and proper use of techniques being considered cheating." Reyna responded coolly.

"Alright, a deals a deal." Nico said as he stood up and gestured to the door. "Get out."

"Best two out of three!" Eurytion begged.

"What? No!" Thalia disagreed, pulling out her mace, which quickly turned into a lance. "A deal is a deal! Now get, the fuck, OUT!"

"Eurytion, man, let's just go! If we stay these punks might actually try and kill us!" The surfer begged.

"Chiron said this is a safe haven! They can't do that!" Eurytion protested.

"You're right. We can't harm you." Percy said with a shrug. "That doesn't mean we can't harm your root beer supply."

"Wait, what?" Eurytion's face fell as soon as Percy threatened his precious soda.

"I've got the Hephaestus cabin standing by." Percy gestured out the door. He grabbed a walking talkie from his back pocket, and pressed the talk button. "Team alpha, stand by for root beer demolition. Get ready, over."

_Chhrrzzzk _"This is Haephestus team alpha, we read you loud and clear Aqua Lad. Over." The walkie talkie confirmed.

"Like you know where we hid the root beer!" The surfer challenged, attempting to call a bluff.

Percy pressed the button again. "Team alpha, I'm gonna need a confirmation on root beer location. Over."

_Chhrrzzzk _"Root beer as been located in large crates stacked next to the fire pit. Over." Team alpha once again confirmed.

"Boss, maybe it wasn't such a good idea to leave it in plain site." The dreadlock pony whispered to Eurytion.

"Boys, relax! This guy is obviously bluffing! There's no way this camp has enough explosives to destroy all of the crates." Eurytion said coolly, stroking his hair back.

"Yeah we'll see about that." Percy growled. He spoke once again into the walkie talkie. "Team alpha, you're clear for demolition. Over."

_Chhrrzzzk "_Right on, Aqua Lad. FIRE IN THE HOLE!" The camper at the other end yelled.

Right on queue, a huge, rumbling boom sounded through the camp, followed by what sounded like rain.

"That's uh… oh crap!" Eurytion and his cronies flew out the bunker door, screaming and cursing all the while.

"Oh man, I've gotta see this!" Thalia squealed as she hurdled over the coach and out the door.

"Right behind you!" Nico agreed, following his girlfriend.

"Whose house? Haephestus's house!" Leo cheered as he fist pumped his way out the door.

Malcolm and Reyna shared a pleased look before bolting out the door together, Nyssa and the Stoll brothers following after.

"You know something, Seaweed brain?" Annabeth asked her boyfriend as he cooly leaned against the wall, laughing to himself. "Sometimes, you truly are brilliant."

"I may not be the smartest camper that ever lived," Percy responded, putting his arm around Annabeth and walking out through the door, "but I have my moments."

The scene outside looking like a tsunami had ripped through camp. The ground was soaked in a frothy slush of root beer and mud with pieces of aluminum cans and box debris floating around on top.

"What on earth happened?" A familiar voice called from behind Percy and Annabeth. Annabeth turned to see Grover, looking completely confused.

"Percy and the Hephaestus cabin blew up the Party Ponies' root beer supply." Annabeth explained, looking around at the destruction.

"Well that's one way to get them to leave." Grover commented, stepping gingerly over the debris.

"NO! NOOOOO!" Several centaurs screamed as they realized their root beer was gone. Almost all of the other centaurs had taken off over the hill, either scared from the blast or for their lives.

"JAAACKSOOON!" Clarisse's loud, thundering voice boomed. Annabeth and Percy turned to see the Ares girl bounding towards Percy. She was soaked to the skin with root beer with pieces of aluminum can stuck in her hair.

"Love you, gotta go, by!" Percy shot out as he bolted away from Clarisse, Grover and Annabeth snickering at his predicament.

"What a waste of aluminum cans though." Grover complained as he and Annabeth made their way through the sticky, muddy camp.

"Better this than Party Pony central." Annabeth pointed out.

"Annabeth!" Ariadne's voice shot out from the Athena cabin's porch, where she and August were wringing out their hair and clothes. "Where's that stupid boyfriend of yours? I'm gonna kill him!"

"Ariadne, calm down!" August said through bouts of laughter. She obviously found the situation funnier than anyone else. "Let's just go jump in the lake and wash off."

"Must you treat everything as a joke?" Ariadne shot back.

"Must you treat everything so seriously?" August imitated, causing Ariadne to punch her in the shoulder.

"What happened here?" Jason asked as he walked down the path from the Jupiter portal. His dry clothes let Annabeth know that he hadn't been around for the explosion.

"Party Ponies showed up, we played them at Team Fortress and won, then Percy blew up their root beer supply." Annabeth explained.

"And now we're flooded." Grover added.

"Man, why don't awesome things like this happen at Jupiter?" Jason complained. "Anyways, have you seen Piper?"

"She's probably in her cabin, cleaning up." Annabeth guessed.

"Hey, tomorrow, after everything is less sticky, let me join in on a TF two match." Jason said, walking towards the Aphrodite cabin.

"My pleasure!" Annabeth called back. "But first, I think I'm going to join August in jumping into the lake."

* * *

><p><em>We haven't seen the last of Team Fortress 2. Because next chapter is, in my opinion, one of the funnier I've had in a while. <em>


	29. Chapter 28

**Chapter 28: Annabeth Gets Schooled**

Annabeth woke up the next morning, having taken a gloriously hot shower the night before, feeling better than she had in a while. The summer cold had completely moved itself out, the sun was shining, there were no party ponies, and she could finally get back to having a normalish summer.

"_All the other kids with their pumped up kicks, better run baby run…" _Annabeth sang quietly to herself as she pulled on some fresh clothes.

"You do realize that song is about school shootings?" Malcolm's voice asked from his bunk.

"_Out run my bullets." _Ariadne finished.

"You guys are weird." Malcolm grumbled, slumping out of his bed as Annabeth drew back the changing curtain and stretched.

"Says the guy who sings rap songs to himself while playing Legend of Zelda." Annabeth teased. "Finally, I get to be productive!"

"Even though for half of yesterday you sat on your butt watching YouTube?" Ariadne said with a half smile.

"Well I can't be happy doing that all the time. I have ADHD too you know." Annabeth reminded her sister.

"I'm not so sure I have ADHD." Ariadne mused.

In response, Malcolm took his Air Soft laser and pointed it at the wall. It immediately caught Ariadne's eye as she watched it move wherever Malcolm pointed. "So you don't have ADHD?"

"Oh shut it!" Ariadne hissed, falling back onto her bed.

"Where is everyone?" Annabeth asked, realizing that aside from the three of them, the cabin was deserted.

"Clean up duty." Ariadne said, pointing outside to where almost all of the campers were scrubbing, sweeping, mopping, or picking something up from yesterday's root beer explosion.

"Only the head counselors don't have to. Instead, we have a meeting." Malcolm grumbled.

"What about breakfast?" Annabeth asked. Come to think of it, she hadn't even heard the morning horn blow.

"Chiron personally woke everyone up and hour earlier. He seems… not pleased." Malcolm explained.

"What time is it?" Annabeth asked, looking at her watch. It read five till seven. They still had five minutes to go before the morning horn.

"We best be getting to that meeting." Malcolm gestured out the door.

"Hang on, what are you still doing here?" Annabeth asked Ariadne, who was still sitting on her bed.

"I caught your cold, thank you very much." Ariadne grumbled, sniffling afterwards.

"Oh, sorry about that." Annabeth apologized, feeling her sister's grey eyes burrowing into her.

"Not your fault. It's the karma I get for being a lazy ass." Ariadne complained as she slumped over onto her side.

"Meeting time, Anna. Come on." Malcolm urged. "We're late as is, and I know that you know how scary Chiron can be when he's not happy."

"You're right, let's go." Annabeth agreed. "Feel better!" She called to Ariadne before exiting the cabin. "Why's he mad?" Annabeth asked her brother as they made their way to the big house.

"I think his pride was hurt with mom bashed him giving us laptops." Malcolm guessed. "Or he's getting old. Either one."

"Oh don't say that!" Annabeth chided, defending her mentor.

"What? He's like over a two thousand years old!" Malcolm reminded her as they stepped on the porch of the big house.

"I heard that!" Chiron griped as Malcolm stepped in the door. "But it's true. I am over two thousand years old." He chuckled, gesturing to the empty two seats around the table.

All the councilors were present. Leo, Clarisse, Piper, Percy and the regular lot, and even Clovis got out of bed.

"It's not any understatement that you all have seen the state of the camp as of this morning." Chiron said as he eyed each camper around the table. Annabeth wasn't sure if Chiron was trying to guilt trip them or not, but she didn't feel guilty. They did what had to be done.

"We did what had to be done, Sir." Percy spoke up, taking the words right out of Annabeth's mouth.

"I know that Perseus, you don't have to tell me." Chiron said sternly. "I'm here to tell you all that I'm proud of you for handling the situation on your own, but equal work for equal pay is in order. Your siblings are all cleaning as we speak, which means that for the rest of the clean up, however long that takes, you'll be taking over their chores."

A universal groan overtook the table as Chiron grabbed his clipboard and scanned through it. "Hey, I wasn't the one who blew the root beer sky high. And don't try and weasel your way out of this saying your cabin wasn't involved. Everyone stood around and watched it blow, so you're all going to clean it.

"So let's see here. Percy, Thalia, and Nico, you'll just be going about your daily duties. Have fun, you may leave." He waved them off as they stood and exited the big house.

"Piper, your cabin had inspection duty. Hop to it." Chiron read. Piper silently did an inward fist pump as she stood and left, her chore not containing any serious labor.

"Leo, you'll be cleaning up the forge." Chiron continued.

"Nothing new." Leo shrugged, standing and leaving.

"Chris, your cabin was supposed to be on stable duty with Iris's cabin. You and Butch may go." Chiron made another check on his clipboard as Chris nodded Butch to follow him out. "Katie, strawberry tending with Pollux. Malcolm and Annabeth, kitchen duty."

"Alrighty, let's go." Malcolm said as he nodded Annabeth behind him.

After breakfast, Malcolm and Annabeth set to their chores and began preparing for lunch.

"It's weird to me that this is actually easier with just the two of us." Malcolm commented as he sliced sandwich loaves for the sandwiches.

"Well you know what they say. Too many cooks in the kitchen spoil the soup." Annabeth quoted as she set to dicing another batch of onions for the actual soup. She wiped her eyes with her sleeve, as she had forgotten to cut with the grain of the onions, and the odor was getting to her.

"What's wrong? Sad that Seventh Heaven ended?" Malcolm teased as Annabeth took a dishrag and wiped her whole face.

"Haha, so funny." She griped. "Stupid onions."

"It's ok, I know how much you loved that show." Malcolm continued.

"Shut up or I'm sticking this between your ribs." Annabeth pointed the large cooking knife directly between Malcolm's eyes.

"You would too." Malcolm laughed. "What's Seaweed brain's chore today?"

"Hey!" Annabeth stopped and viciously jammed the point of the knife into the cutting board. "Only I'm allowed to call him that!"

"Ok, ok sorry!" Malcolm apologized, shying away from Annabeth. "Didn't realize."

Annabeth sighed and yanked the knife out of the board and continued dicing. "You'll get to that stage, trust me."

"Reyna? Pet names?" Malcolm looked at Annabeth like she had just gone insane and started reciting Satanic verse.

"Hey, happened to me." Annabeth said with a smile and a shrug.

"Oh right, wise girl." Malcolm teased.

"What did I just say?" Annabeth turned, knife in hand, towards Malcolm and began advancing forward.

"I think I'll be taking this." Percy's voice said as Percy proceeded to take the knife from Annabeth.

"Come on, Percy. I wasn't really going to hurt him… _much." _The last word came out with a threatening hiss as she turned back towards her brother, who had picked up the kitchen broom to defend himself.

"What were you to talking about anyways?" Percy asked as he leaned against the wall, Annabeth and Malcolm getting back to work.

"Pet names." Malcolm said, eyeing Annabeth carefully.

"You and Reyna come up with any?" Percy asked.

"Was I seriously the last one to know about that relationship?" Annabeth asked exasperatedly.

"To answer Percy's question, no. To answer your question, also no. I told Percy because he saw us walking out of the library in New Rome together." Malcolm explained.

"Alrighty. So you guys up for a match later?" Percy asked.

"Sure. Always am." Malcolm nodded, getting back to bread slicing.

"Yeah sure." Annabeth seconded.

Later that afternoon, Leo, Percy, Annabeth, and Malcolm had all shown up for another round of Team Fortress. Reyna had shown up to, more to be with Malcolm than to play, though Malcolm was attempting to teach her the basics.

"No, that's jump." Malcolm explained to Reyna as Annabeth and Percy poured drinks.

"And this is mele, and that's primary weapon." Reyna confirmed. "Here, let's let Leo play the first match." She said as she handed the controller to Leo.

"We ready?" Percy asked, sitting down with his Monster energy.

"I probably should have talked you out of drinking that." Annabeth said as she watched him down half the glass.

"Too late! Let's go." Percy pressed start, and the match had begun.

"Ok, Annabeth plan beta." Malcolm instructed.

"Beta?" Annabeth asked. She wasn't his primary gamer companion, and had no idea what he was talking about.

"Er… take your Spy and start back stabbing." Malcolm restated.

"Ah, gotcha." Annabeth nodded.

"Leo, ammo and turrets. Never enough." Malcolm continued.

"On it!" Leo said as he shoved three Oreos into his mouth.

"Disgusting." Reyna commented.

"Delicious." Leo responded as he swallowed.

"Percy, go crazy." Malcolm finalized.

"Don't have to tell me twice!" Percy said enthusiastically as his scout began smacking around the other team's.

"There are some interesting gamer tags on the other team." Reyna pointed out as she looked at the opposite team's list.

"Which ones?" Malcolm asked, not looking up.

"Strigidae." Reyna read out loud.

"That's the name of the order that the owl family belongs to." Annabeth explained not thinking too much of it.

"And DogOfWar." Reyna continued. "EarthShakerWaveMaker, SunnySideWorldWide. If I didn't know better…"

"Ah fucking shit face!" Percy interrupted Reyna's train of thought as he swore harshly. His scout had been taken down be a pyro.

"Haha, punk!" The pyro's player laughed through the headset.

Malcolm almost stopped playing as he heard the voice. "He sounds familiar."

"No time for that. Gotta find that brief ca- AW SHIT!" Leo also swore as his Engineer had been sniped. "I thought I was out of range of fire too."

"Hey, ChaseMe." Another voice called through the headset, directed at Annabeth. Hearing it, Annabeth's heart stopped. "Heads up!" _CRACK. _EarthShaker's scout took out her spy with the baseball bat, and then took off.

Annabeth got out of her shock, now angry. "You mother f-"

"Don't finish that sentence, Annabeth." A wise voice commanded. "And Percy, I'm not sorry." _BOOM. _Instant headshot to Percy's scout.

"How many are you are on this server?" Annabeth asked, now well aware that the Gods were taking some free time.

"We've got your mother, me, Apollo, and Ares." Poseidon explained as Ares continued to incinerate Half-Blood's team as they were too in shock to move.

"We didn't invite you." Athena said flatly, obviously talking to Poseidon.

"Then you should have locked the match before I could enter." Poseidon responded, using his Scout to gun down Malcolm's sniper as he was trying to get to a better position.

"Look what I can do!" Apollo drew attention to his spy as he proceeded to grab Half-Blood team's briefcase.

"Apollo! Stop announcing your victories dammit!" Ares yelled, now duking it out with Annabeth.

_BOOM. _"Hey!" Leo yelled as Athena proceeded to snipe him yet again.

"Then move to a safer location next time." Athena said coolly.

"The gods play Xbox?" Reyna asked, shocked. "I thought the names were just a bad coincidence."

"It helps relieve stress." Apollo explained right before Annabeth's spy stabbed him in the back and took back the briefcase. "You little shit, I will end you!"

"Apollo! Language!" Athena chided.

"You'd be swearing to if they knew where you were." Ares laughed.

"Wait, if you play TF two, why were you so mad when I decided to use this instead of fight the ponies?" Annabeth asked.

"Are you being serious right now?" Athena asked back. "You don't gain monster fighting skills from stabbing medics."

Annabeth still didn't like that answer. "Yeah but…" _STAB_

"Stop asking questions!" Apollo commanded as he grabbed the suitcase and ran off yet again.

"I feel as though we're at a disadvantage." Malcolm said coolly, but unhappily.

_CRACK. _"Dad, what the fuck?" Percy yelled as Poseidon laughed victoriously.

"That's really the only smart thing you've ever done." Athena said flatly.

"Oh shut it!" Poseidon growled as Athena continued to pick the campers off from her hidden location.

"Oh you guys are toast." Jason commented, causing Annabeth to almost jump out of her skin.

"How long have you been standing there?" She asked as she turned to see Jason and Piper in the doorway, only to get killed, yet again, by Ares.

"A couple of minutes." Jason answered as he lounged in the recliner, Piper sitting down in his lap.

"I must say, you guys getting your butts handed to you by your parents is rather amusing." Piper commented, laughing.

Suddenly, Malcolm froze in his seat. "Oh shit."

"What?" Annabeth asked, and then froze. Malcolm had found Athena's sniper making his way to another location, failing to sneak away quietly. He wasted no time ambushing her, only to be shot dead on when he got too close.

"Dammit! I was sure I had that!" Malcolm cursed, almost throwing his controller across the room.

_BOOM. _"Don't worry, I did!" Percy yelled victoriously as Athena's sniper collapsed, Percy's scout standing over her.

"All according to plan." Athena mused.

"BAHAHA HE FELL FOR THAT!" Ares guffawed as Apollo's spy reached his team's checkpoint with the campers' briefcase while everyone was distracted.

"Aw dammit." Percy said quietly as he sat back down in his seat looking defeated.

"That was… incredibly smart." Annabeth admitted.

"Where do you think you get it from?" Athena asked proudly.

"Ok! Someone give me the controller!" Jason demanded.

"With pleasure." Annabeth said as she got up and handed hers to Jason. "Malcolm and I have to get to kitchen duty for dinner."

"Awww…" Malcolm groaned. "Someone take mine then." He tossed his controller onto the sofa. "We'll see you all shortly."

With that, they walked out of the bunker into the golden hued camp.

* * *

><p><em>As you all probably know, I love writing this story. I find it fun and refreshing from a hard day's work doing whatever it is I did that day. However, I know that stories can't just keep going and going, as much as I would really love for them to. So, I'm probably going to wrap up ACvtI around chapter forty. <strong>But wait, there's more! <strong>I'll be starting a new story that's a little different from this one, but still light and not just ANGST DRAMA ANGST called **Signed, Annabeth.** It will basically be diary entrees by Annabeth during her daily life, but not just at camp. It might be at home, camp, with Percy, what she found online, what crazy thing happened that day, what have you. It will be a less timeline oriented, and more like every chapter is a short story. I'm thinking it will be fun! And I think you guys will enjoy it too!  
><em>

_Also, in case you were all wondering, because I'm totally sure you all are always wondering what I'm thinking at all times, I firmly believe that Annabeth is a fan of Indie and techno music. And her favorite band is either Passion Pit or Owl City.  
><em>


	30. Chapter 29

**Chapter 29: Annabeth Sings Top 40 and then Gets Into an Internet Argument**

"My hands will never not smell like onions." Malcolm complained as he and Annabeth walked back to their cabin after cleaning up the kitchen. Neither of them cared how good grilled onions were on burgers; the smell was enough to make everyone in a ten-foot radius turn and run the other way when they walked by.

"Ugh, tell me about it." Annabeth agreed. "All day kitchen duty is probably going on my top five list of worst days at camp."

"Hey, finding out mom plays Team Fortress was pretty hilarious though. It wasn't all bad!" Malcolm reminded her. Annabeth shrugged and nodded, not disagreeing.

They stepped into the cabin, tired and reeking. Thankfully, all the other campers had gone off for nighttime activities, leaving Annabeth and Malcolm free to take long showers.

Malcolm flopped onto his bunk, not caring to even take his shoes off. "Hey do you think that…"

"SHHH!" Annabeth hushed, pointing towards Ariadne's bunk, where Ariadne had curled up into a fetal position under the covers, and August had passed out on top of the covers on her back next to her.

"Oh, sorry." Malcolm whispered, picking up his towel and his shower caddy off the floor. "I'm going to hit up the showers."

"Me too." Annabeth whispered back.

_"I used to roll the dice, strike fear into enemies eyes." _Annabeth sang, rinsing the shampoo out of her hair, hoping the lemon scent would take the onion smell away with it.

"Annabeth! Shut up!" Malcolm demanded through the vent in the wall from the boy's bathroom. Annabeth wished the architecture had been better when it came to dealing with the bathrooms. The noise carrying between walls as if they were made of paper got old, and at times disgusting, very fast.

"Why? Do I have a bad singing voice?" Annabeth asked sincerely, now feeling self-conscious.

"No, you sing fine. I just hate that song!" Malcolm called back. "Sing something that isn't top forty radio!"

"I am ashamed to be called your sister!" Annabeth said disapprovingly. "Coldplay is awesome!"

"I'm not saying they're not! I'm saying that song is over played." Malcolm corrected.

"Fine, fine. I'll pick something else." Annabeth begrudgingly agreed. "_You sit there in your, heart ache."_

"That's still top 40!" Malcolm called back, still not happy.

"You love the Killers!" Annabeth called back, not happy that Malcolm was shooting down her every song.

There was a pause. _"Waiting on some beautiful boy to, save you from your old ways!" _Malcolm joined in, passing off surprisingly well for Brandon Flowers.

"_You play forgiveness, watch him now here he comes!" _Annabeth followed.

"You guys are dorks." Will's voice came through the wall as his shower could be heard turning on.

"Oh, oh really?" Malcolm said condescendingly. "What would you have us sing, oh righteous music douche?"

"_I got the magic in me! Every time I touch that track it turns in to gold!" _Will's husky and vibrant voice called out. Annabeth rolled her eyes silently, cursing Apollo for blessing all of his kids with incredible music talent and cockiness.

"Oh come on! I said no top 40!" Malcolm complained. Annabeth laughed to herself as she turned off her shower, having finally rinsed all the soap off and hopefully the onion smell, and wrapped her robe around her before heading back to her cabin.

When she got to the porch, Chiron was standing on the porch talking to August in a hushed, but worried tone. Annabeth caught the conversation as she got closer.

"She ate a sandwich at lunch, but she felt pretty hot even then. And she drank most of the broth I brought her for dinner, even though she wasn't that hungry, and passed out. She threw it all back up when she woke up half an hour later, and she's been breathing heavy and feels like she's completely burning up and looks pretty dehydrated." August explained.

"That escalated quickly." Annabeth joined in once she realized they were talking about Ariadne.

Suddenly, Sandy, Apollo's oldest daughter, came rushing out onto the porch.

"Chiron, her fever is 104 degrees, and she's having trouble remaining conscious. She needs to go to the infirmary and get a liquid IV in her." Sandy explained.

"Where's Will?" Chiron asked, looking stern.

"He just got in the shower." Annabeth said quickly, now worried.

Chiron turned to August. "Go yell into the showers…"

"On it!" August said, taking off towards the bathrooms before Chiron could finish.

Annabeth stepped into the cabin with Sandy. Sandy rushed back toward's Ariadne's side, where Ariadne wasn't looking too good. She had flipped onto her back, and was panting, sweating, and red.

"Anna…" She croaked up, turning to her sister with glassy eyes.

"I know, I know, I'm sorry." Annabeth apologized, stroking Ariadne's hair out of her face.

Ariadne weakly shook her head. "No… no need… not your fault…"

"She's right you know." Sandy agreed. "This looks more like a really bad case of the flu than a cold. She probably was a carrier for a long time before it decided to become active. I'll bet you anything you caught something from her than her catching it from you."

"Is it safe to just carry her?" Will asked as he came bursting back into the cabin. He had barely thrown on a pair of shorts and a wife beater from the shower, and was still soaking wet.

"That should be fine." Sandy said as stood up to get out of Will's way.

Will scooped Ariadne up in his arms, August holding the door for him, and Will and Sandy promptly headed for the infirmary.

"God that sucks hardcore." August said as she watched her siblings go. She walked back towards Ariadne's bunk and grabbed the empty soup thermos and her hoodie.

"Tell me about it. I don't know if I'd rather be sick or injured at camp." Annabeth shook her head, thinking both terrible. She looked up at August, who seemed pretty distraught.

"She'll be ok, you know." Annabeth reassured her.

"Yeah I know." August shrugged. "Still doesn't make it suck any less." And with that, August walked out of the cabin.

"I came running when I saw Will carry out your sister." Percy stammered as he came once again barreling into the cabin. "Is everything ok?"

"She has the flu." Annabeth said as she drew the changing curtain to put pajamas on.

"Oh that sucks." Percy said exasperatedly. "She looked like she had been wandering in a desert."

"Kind of similar." Annabeth agreed.

"She shouldn't spend the night in the infirmary alone. I'll stay." Percy volunteered, his niceness taking over once again.

"You don't have to. I'm her senior councilor." Annabeth reminded him as she stepped out from behind the curtain and pulled her hair into a ponytail. "Besides, I can catch up on some reading."

"Alright. Hope she feels better." Percy said as he walked off the porch with Annabeth.

"What are you reading?" Ariadne croaked as Annabeth lounged in the cot next to hers in the infirmary.

"Go to sleep." Annabeth said quietly, knowing full and well that Will had given her a double dose of Nyquil to put her to sleep, and that it wasn't working.

"Can't. Needle… in my arm." Ariadne groaned as she tried to reach over to her other arm and pull out the drip IV of saline that was carefully inserted into her arm and taped down.

"No, don't do that." Annabeth chided quietly as she gently pulled Ariadne away from her arm for the fifth time that evening.

"But I don't like it." Ariadne complained childishly.

"You've got five minutes left until you're finished." Annabeth reminded her, also for the fifth time that night.

"What are you reading?" Ariadne asked again.

"Ender's Game." Annabeth answered.

"Read out loud." Ariadne half demanded, half asked.

"I'm almost done, and you won't get it." Annabeth once again answered.

"Is it good?" Ariadne asked, fighting sleep with every ounce of energy.

"Yes, now go to sleep." Annabeth said, not wanting to keep Ariadne up.

"I'm… not…" And then Ariadne passed out.

_Finally. _Annabeth thought to herself. She finished the last page of Ender's Game, and set the book down. She looked at the clock, slowly ticking by. It was only nine, and Annabeth wasn't sleepy. _Great, and I'm bored. _

"Ender's Game? I loved that book." Sandy said softly as she entered the room.

"What are you doing here?" Annabeth asked.

"I'm here to take Ariadne's needle out." Sandy explained, walking over to Ariadne's right side and carefully peeling back the medical tape, and then gently sliding out the needle. The second she touched the needle, Ariadne's eyes shot open, though Ariadne didn't look completely there.

Sandy looked back at her, waiting for a response that never came. Sandy finally spoke first. "What's your name?"

"Samantha." Ariadne answered, only to pass back out again.

Annabeth laughed silently at the absurdity of the response.

"August talks in her sleep too." Sandy said softly. "August, what's your favorite color? Pancakes. August, where do you live? The moon. August, who's your daddy? Wilfred Brimley."

Annabeth tried to get over her laughing fit, trying not to wake Ariadne, and changed the subject. "So you've read Ender's Game."

"Yeah. The book was good, but the author is a dick bag." Sandy said, her face going sour.

"He is?" Annabeth asked quietly as Sandy sat on the foot of Annabeth's cot.

"Yeah he's Mormon, which isn't bad in itself, but he's a bigot and says that gay is a disease." Sandy explained with an eye roll.

"Seriously?" Annabeth couldn't believe it.

"Yeah, you can actually draw a lot of parallels between Ender's Game and the Mormon religion." Sandy pointed out. "Hang on, let me show you something."

She grabbed her backpack and took out an iPad, touching the screen and typing in something to Google. "See, right here. It's a whole list of similarities between Ender's Game and Mormonism as Mormons see it." Sandy said, handing over the iPad.

"Let me see that." Annabeth took the iPad and scrolled through the list. She couldn't deny that the symbolism was uncanny.

"See, I'm not lyin'." Sandy said as she pointed to a few of her favorites over Annabeth's shoulder.

"What's this about Battle Field Earth?" Annabeth saw a side link to another forum topic about the so-bad-its-good sci-fi film.

"Turns out Battle Field Earth is the Ender's Game of Scientologists. Only a hundred percent less subtle." Sandy grumbled. "What are you doing?" Sandy asked.

"Replying to this forum topic." Annabeth responded, typing quickly.

"On my account?" Sandy asked. Annabeth nodded. "No, no, no, no, no and NO. No." Sandy rejected, attempting to take the iPad away. "I pay good money to be a part of the Something Awful forums and I'm not about to get banned for your opinions on the matter."

"Most of these are anti-scientology anyways." Annabeth responded, jerking the iPad back. "I'm just saying how terrible Battle Field Earth was."

"That's what I was afraid of." Sandy whined.

"Oh Christ…" Annabeth grumbled, realizing her mistake.

"What? What did you do?" Sandy asked, now worried.

"Turns out these nerds like this movie more than I thought. But it was so bad!" Annabeth disagreed verbally and online.

"Stop, just stop." Sandy begged, again trying to take the iPad as Annabeth maneuvered away from her.

"No wait! I have a valid point!" Annabeth argued.

"I'm sure you do, but that's my account!" Sandy protested, taking her index and middle finger and jamming them under Annabeth's ribs.

Annabeth shrieked and let go of the iPad, tumbling off the bed.

"Holy shit, both of you SHUT UP." Ariadne demanded, sitting up and yelling at the two of them before collapsing back down onto the bed.

Sandy and Annabeth looked at each other for a few seconds. "I'm going back to my cabin." Sandy finally said.

"Not a bad idea." Annabeth agreed. As soon as Sandy left, Annabeth's phone buzzed.

"If yer sis is feeling better tom, u shud com play ninja tag." Percy texted.

"Alrighty." Annabeth texted back. "See you in the morning." Annabeth lay back on her cot, looking up at the ceiling. However, she couldn't help but feel like she was being watched.

"Annabeth." A familiar voice said sternly. "I need to talk to you."

* * *

><p><em>If you're in college and you know it clap you hands! *clap clap*<br>So yeah, I'm in college. And that means these updates will be no more than weekly at best. But, good news is that this filler chapter makes way to a pretty crazy story line. Also, I love Rocky Horror Picture Show. _


	31. Chapter 30

**Chapter 30: Annabeth Goes LARPing**

"Mother!" Annabeth exclaimed in a hushed voice as she stood to face her divine parent. "What do I owe this visit?" She asked, praying that it wasn't another mandatory quest.

"Don't give me that look." Athena retorted, giving Annabeth and exasperated expression.

"What look?" Annabeth asked, looking at her mother sideways and cocking an eyebrow.

"I'm not here to put another mark on you. I promise." Athena assured her daughter, while walking towards the bed.

"Forgive me if my trust towards you has been bruised." Annabeth griped.

"I've told you time and time again, you're still the favorite." Athena answered back, looking like she had done so over a hundred times before. Annabeth rolled her eyes. "What I'm really here to tell you is that we're hitting another snag with the titans I'm afraid." She said as she and Annabeth both sat back down on the cot.

"Wait what?" Annabeth asked, more annoyed than concerned. _Here we go again. _She thought to herself.

"I wouldn't worry too much. This has little to do with you." Athena reassured.

"Wait… _**what**__?" _Annabeth asked again, now shocked. It always had something to do with her.

"Your sister on the other hand," Athena turned back towards Ariadne, who was fast asleep on the other cot, "well let's just hope she feels better in about a week."

"Hang on, you've got to give me more of an explanation!" Annabeth demanded in a hissed voice.

"I'm afraid I've given you all I can." Athena said, standing up and walking towards Ariadne's bunk. She stroked back Ariadne's hair that was drenched in sweat from the fever.

"Why must you all be so cryptic?" Annabeth groaned.

"Blame your grandfather." Athena rolled her eyes and walked back towards the door. "One more thing."

"Yes?" Annabeth sighed, expecting another 'why I hate Percy' rant.

"32. Remember that number, because it's the age I would prefer you having kids." She casually mentioned before closing the door to the infirmary behind her. With a blinding flash, Athena was gone.

"_Why does everyone know about my personal business?" _Annabeth whispered in embarrassment to herself as she laid down for sleep.

"No, you can't be a rouge!" Malcolm protested.

"Why not?" Percy argued from across the table.

"Because I'm the rogue!" Malcolm answered definitively.

"We can have more than one rogue." Annabeth casually mentioned as she filled out her character sheet. The day ended up being sweltering and absolutely miserable out, so Malcolm organized a Dungeons and Dragons game for the head councilors after lunch. Even some Roman's showed up to escape the heat, Jupiter's cabins not having nearly as much relief while sitting on packed dirt as opposed to grass like Half-Blood.

Currently though, everyone seemed to be arguing and complaining more than actually playing.

"You can't both be rogues without a meat shield." Connor pointed out.

"Fuck it, I'll pick barbarian and be the damned meat shield! Happy?" Clarisse slammed her fist down on the table, shutting everyone up.

"Love, let's not start unnecessary fights." Chris calmed his significant other. Clarisse rolled her eyes.

"Ok… I have no idea what I'm doing." Piper grumbled from behind her paper.

"Just, you know, pick stuff." Jason shrugged. Neither of them had ever attempted to play Dungeons and Dragons, and were currently floundering.

"Why am I stuck with ranger?" Reyna complained from her seat in between Malcolm and Annabeth.

"Because I got stuck with bard." Will complained from across the table.

"You are a bard." Reyna grumbled.

"Doesn't make it any less of a sucky class." Will complained.

"Bard is not a sucky class!" Malcolm shot back.

"I get to be fighter! That means all of you are toast." Leo laughed to himself as he was still happy that he ended up with fighter.

"So what exactly does a wizard do?" Hazel asked.

"Yeah, what does a sorcerer do while we're at it?" Frank added in.

"Ok, ok, everyone calm down!" Malcolm demanded. "I'll go over everything once more…"

"I brought cupcakes!" August proudly announced, bursting through the Bunker 9 door. "… Are you all serious right now?" August's face fell as she saw everyone sitting around a table writing stuff down, and that Dungeons and Dragon's wasn't a violent video game like she had expected.

"Hey, D 'n D is cool!" Percy protested.

"What Seaweed brain said!" Annabeth agreed. Percy shot her a fake hurt look.

"Can't we LARP this outside?" August asked.

"Larp?" Annabeth, Reyna, and Hazel all repeated.

"Live action role play." Malcolm rephrased. "And no because it's too hot outside!"

"Since when do you care about heat?" August grumbled, placing the cupcake box on the table.

"So wait. We could be reenacting our characters and scenarios outside?" Jason asked, looking like an idea had just sprung up on him.

"That's the basic idea, yes." Malcolm nodded, trying to get back on subject.

"Oh gods I totally want to be a wandering minstrel." Will enthusiastically said, taking his mandolin from behind his seat and playing a few chords.

"Does that mean I get to physically fight all of y'all?" Clarisse asked.

Malcolm raised his hands to settle everyone down, "Kind of but-"

"Dude, this is an awesome idea!" Leo agreed, half a cup cake shoved into his mouth, red icing tainting his lips.

"Hmmm… good exercise." Reyna mused out loud.

"Gives me a chance to show off some new unarmed moves as a monk." Annabeth agreed.

"Outside! Yay?" August nodded enthusiastically at Malcolm.

"Fine! Fine, you win. Outside it is. Everyone finish your character sheets, grab some appropriate armor, and meet outside." Malcolm caved.

"I regret this decision." Malcolm grumbled as he fell to the ground, having been kicked once more by Clarisse. It was way too hot, and he was losing his touch.

"HI-YAH!" Annabeth screamed in battle cry as she slammed into Clarisse, locking her into a headlock and forcing her to the ground. "Minus 15 HP for you."

"What?!" Clarisse yelled. "Bull crap! Couldn't have been more than five! Malcolm, judgment call!"

"Speed tackle into headlock?" He confirmed as he blocked another attack from Jason as a fighter while scrambling to get up, "I'd say that's ten."

"Oh come on!" Annabeth and Clarisse both growled in unison.

"Ow! Ow! Frank, stop biting me!" Percy demanded as Frank had chosen to use his animal shifting powers as his main attacks, and was currently snapping at Percy as a very angry snapping turtle.

"Two HP for each bite!" Malcolm called as Reyna jumped over him, slamming into Leo.

"Dammit!" Percy yelled as he sprinted away from Frank, only to be trailed by Hazel who was currently pelting him with gemstones.

"I'm going to say that all rubies are fire balls." Hazel yelled after Percy.

"Three HP for rubies then!" Malcolm called back.

_**SMACK **_"Ow! Christ Leo, do you have to be so violent?" Will whined as Leo sprinted away from his victim after bashing him in the ribs with a shield.

"That's the point of the game!" Leo yelled back.

"Annabeth?" Annabeth heard a voice from a near by tree as she stopped to catch her breath. "What are you doing?" She asked as she dropped down.

"Apparently, Thalia, I'm playing live action Dungeons and Dragons." Annabeth shrugged, like her life couldn't physically get any weirder.

Thalia shook her head and laughed softly to herself. She looked positively girly in her hot weather get up of a black tank top and small jean shorts with her hair tied back. "Of all the nerdy things you could have done, this is the nerdiest."

"I beg to differ." Annabeth disagreed, leaning up against a large tree in order to catch her breath and drink some water from her camelback-pack. "My yearly pilgrimage to ComicCon is nerdier."

"Can't disagree there." Nico agreed as he dropped down from the same tree. His swim trunks and Ramones t-shirt made him look almost normal.

"We're going to the movies to escape the heat." Thalia said as she wiped her forehead with her forearm.

"I don't want to third wheel you guys." Annabeth answered, thinking how awkward it would be to be there third member. Then she immediately felt bad for Grover all those summers while questing with her and Percy.

"Invite Percy. We are going to see Pirates Four." Nico explained, gesturing to Percy who was now being ganged up on by Reyna and Hazel.

"Oh, I bet he'll love that." Annabeth nodded, thinking about how much Percy loved pirates.

"Great, see you in about an hour then." Thalia said, grabbing Nico's arm. "Come along, Prince of the Underworld. I'd rather spend this hour in your cabin of immense cold and darkness than out here."

"Yes ma'am!" Nico happily agreed. Annabeth didn't want to think any further on what exactly they did in that cabin.

_**FWUMP **_"Ow…" Percy groaned from his new position on the ground.

"Feel like going to see On Stranger Tides?" Annabeth asked, looming over him.

"Anywhere that isn't hot with a chance of ass kicking is fine by me." He answered as he grabbed her hand as she helped him up.

"Awesome. Also, duck." She instructed him, but Percy wasn't fast enough as a large ruby hit him in the temple.

"Ow! That's it! Time for a tsunami of pain!" Percy yelled as he charged back in. Annabeth smiled to herself as she watched him take another tackle from Clarisse.

"He'll never learn." She said to herself.

"Ever seen a mermaid?" Percy asked Annabeth as they sat in the back of the massive theater away from everyone else, excluding Nico and Thalia.

"Yeah, once. When we were in the sea of monsters." She said, shoving a large amount of popcorn into her mouth. Normally, she'd have better manners, but this was Percy, and Percy loved her even when she shoved hazardous amounts of food into her face.

"If you choke, I'm laughing." Thalia said as she dumped back a box of Milk Duds into her mouth.

"Back at'cha." Annabeth responded between chewing.

"Guys, shut up! It's starting." Nico hissed as the previews ended.

As the movie went on, Annabeth found herself thoroughly disappointed. She loved the first two, mostly because she and Percy had marathoned the first two a few weeks after their first summer, and Percy reminded her of roughish Will Turner (though her thirteen year old self would never admit that.) This movie, however, did not have Will, nor did it have cursed pirates that turned into skeletons or fish mutants. Instead it had the Spaniards and some demented mermaids, and they were not nearly as interesting as cursed pirates.

"Anna, hellooooo..." Percy whispered into her ear as she almost shot out of her seat.

"What?" She groaned in response.

"You fell asleep at the last twenty minutes." He whispered, the credits rolling on screen. "Not that I blame you. It kind of sucked."

Annabeth rubbed her eyes and stood up. "Let's pray there won't be a fifth one."

"Something tells me Poseidon will see to it that Pirates will be made indefinitely." Nico complained as the quartet walked out of the theater and into the lobby.

"Dude, don't blame him." Percy argued, "he kind of takes these films as an insult."

"Even the first one?" Annabeth and Thalia asked in unison.

"He's not exactly a fan of the mixed up mythologies and time eras." Percy said with a shrug. "Whatever. I guess I'd be upset to if someone was making movies about my creation that don't make a lot of sense."

"Hm, kind of like how Athena hates Inglourious Basterds." Annabeth agreed.

"What? Seriously?" Percy asked, a look of shock on his face. "It was such a good movie!"

"Well it's the same reason Poseidon doesn't like Pirates. It took something that she was kind of involved in, and mucks it up." Annabeth explained.

Percy opened the door to the outside world, letting a blast of heat in. "Holy cow, it's still a billion degrees outside!"

"Stupid heat." Nico grumbled.

"Stupid sun." Thalia seconded.

"It's supposed to be like this all week." Percy whined. "What happened to piss Apollo off so badly?"

"He's unhappy about something alright." Annabeth agreed, wiping her forehead as the group walked back towards the bus stop to get back to camp.

Suddenly, Percy gasped. "I own a boat!"

"I… that was so random." Annabeth said, completely caught off guard by the outburst. She was used to it from Leo or Connor, but Percy wasn't usually prone to randomness.

"No, wait, I can explain!" Percy held up his hands defense. "Water is cool, and there's like, a ton of lakes up here that are mostly glacier melt, so they're cold."

"Since when do you own a boat?" Thalia asked.

"Well, I don't. But I have access to tons of them." He explained. "I can just borrow one from my dad."

"That's… actually a pretty cool idea." Nico agreed, the idea slowly dawning on him as awesome.

"Heheh. Cool." Percy laughed to himself at the unintentional pun.

"Percy, sometimes you're a genius." Annabeth complimented, retying her hair back.

"That's right, I am! I'll meet you all first thing in the morning in front of the big house!" He instructed. "Tomorrow, we're going boating!"

* * *

><p><em>20 hours of class a week, not including homework and study group time or field trips. On top of that, social life. This is college.<br>But, I haven't forgotten about you all! No sir, I have not! I've been working extra hard to make time to write, just because I love you all so much! I promise, as soon as work mellows out, I will update more!  
>On a lighter note, I LOVE COLLEGE. Oh man, the amount of Percy Jackson fans here is staggering! It's awesome!<br>_


	32. Chapter 31

**Chapter 31: Annabeth's Gotta Catch 'Em All! **

"What SPF is that?"

"Ten."

"Wow. Protective."

"Relax, Seaweed Brain. I won't stay out for more than an hour."

"It smells like coconuts looks like cooking oil. I'm pretty sure my mom has that in her kitchen. What is that stuff?"

"It's suntan oil."

"It makes you smell like a fancy dessert."

"How is that bad? Besides, it makes my skin look good on top of that."

"But it's literally cooking you. Nice job being sun conscious."

"Not my fault I get naturally golden tans while you burn like bacon."

"Yes, great, awesome. Rub it in that you're a natural beauty while I look like something that crawled out of a bad Frankenstein remake."

Annabeth loved the day she was having. Percy had indeed gotten a hold of a boat, a very stylish early 1950's Chris-Craft mahogany mini-yacht that reminded her of Mad Men. They had taken it out to Green Lake state park, parked it in a secluded gulfed in area, and were currently enjoying the sun. Nico, Thalia, Jason, and Piper had joined Percy and Annabeth on the excursion, the boat having plenty of room for everyone. She and Percy had been exchanging bickering flirtatious insults all afternoon, and that's just how she liked it.

"Wonder why Reyna and Malcolm didn't want to come." Piper casually mentioned from the water, where she and Jason were currently floating in on inner tubes.

"Eh, Malcolm get's terribly sea sick." Annabeth responded, stretching out on the deck.

"And Reyna doesn't have the day off like I do." Jason added. A twinge of guilt shadowed under his voice. Annabeth could tell that he still felt guilty that she wouldn't be able to come along, and perhaps for a few other things too.

_**VVVVVRRRRRRRRROOOOOOOOOOOOMMMMMMMM**_

The sound of the Jetski that Nico had convinced Percy to bring along roared into existence. Annabeth looked up through her sunglasses to see Nico steering the jetski, with Thalia wakeboarding behind him.

"When did she get so good at that?" Percy grumbled, jealousy in his voice.

"Beats me." Annabeth answered, no longer paying attention.

"Seriously, that's just not fair." Percy complained. After another bout of complaints, everything went silent. That wasn't what Annabeth wanted to hear, or more like not hear.

"Percy I don't know what you have planned but- OH FOR THE LOVE OF GODS PUT ME DOWN!" She shrieked as Percy picked her up, bridal style, and threw her over board. He followed in shortly after.

"I love you!" He assured her as they floated in a giant air bubble under water that Percy had created.

"I'm sure you do." She said back sarcastically. "You know what this reminds me of?" She asked, a smile tugging at her lips as she put her arms around his neck.

"Our first kiss?" He asked with a tone of hopefulness in his voice.

Before anything could happen, there was a disruption in the water as Nico splashed into existence next to them, giving them a thumbs-up with Thalia following in right after.

"…Great…" Annabeth sighed exasperatedly as Nico and Thalia disturbed the water around them by rushing back up to the surface.

Annabeth and Percy, the mood between them having been ruined, resurfaced to see two unlikely figures on the boat.

"Enjoying the heat?" Hephaestus asked. Annabeth almost had to stifle back a laugh as she noticed his attire. She never thought she'd see the god of smithing in a pair of swim trunks and a wife beater. He toasted towards the four of them with his beer.

"Make sure you put on sunscreen," Aphrodite mentioned from her lounge chair where she was currently tanning, "or else you can get sun spots and no body wants that."

"What are you guys doing here?" Nico asked grumpily. He never understood Aphrodite and her obsession with feelings.

"Well I'm here to hand you all these," Hephaestus said as he pointed to a pile of sharpened weapons sitting on the boat's table, "Because even Zeus could see that they needed some TLC"

"Tender love and care for weaponry?" Thalia asked as she made her way back on deck to examine her sharpened lance.

"Tender? Child, what kind of smith do you take me for? The T stands for tough. Tough love and care." Hephaestus responded, looking offended.

"Now dearest, no use getting your toga in a bunch over a misunderstanding." Aphrodite commented, taking a sip of a fruity drink that was sitting next to her.

"While this is all very nice, why sharpen our weapons for us if we have excellent smiths back at camp?" Annabeth asked, examining her knife. She hadn't even realized it had gone missing off the boat, but then again she had been preoccupied.

"Well I just felt like they could use a real master's touch after so many summers of abuse." Hephaestus explained, picking up Percy's pen and removing the cap to reveal a full sword. "I mean, my children are good, but they can only do so much. The bronze holds tighter in my forge."

"Then what are you doing here, mother?" Piper asked, looking equally as confused as Nico.

"I never miss an opportunity for romance." Aphrodite answered, gesturing to all the couples. "I mean, after last summer I'm sure you all could use a break, and I'm here to make sure all is going well in paradise."

"What's the real reason?" Jason asked, seemingly disinterested in niceties from the gods without a valid explanation. "I mean gods don't just…"

"Look, Jason, as much as I admire the heroics," Aphrodite interjected, "for once try to just accept gifts."

"Why is everyone so nice lately?" Thalia mused as she cracked open a coke.

"Hmp, you know we've been working them too hard when suddenly gifts are looked at as suspicious." Hephaestus commented grumpily.

"By the way, Percy," Aphrodite looked over her ridiculously large sunglasses to get a good look at the boy, "your father would like a word with you as soon as possible. I'm not usually a messenger for the gods, but it seemed rather urgent."

"Uh ok." Percy responded, looking just as confused as Annabeth felt.

"Well then," A smile spread across Hephaestus's face, "who's up for barbeque?" 

The day on the boat had gone rather well, aside from Percy's sun burn and the trip being called short due to the fact that Jason did a massive face forward roll while wake boarding, and wound up with a bloody nose that seemed to persist for several hours. Annabeth cursed herself for not remembering ambrosia or nectar. However, Annabeth had figured that as long as there were no monsters involved, it was a successful trip.

"Annaaaaaaa," Ariadne whined at her sister from her bunk, "you promised."

Annabeth had ended up face down on her own bunk, exhausted from swimming and the heat. "I'm exhausted, Arry. Can't we call it a rain check?"

"Annabeth, seriously, how much actual work have you done since summer started?" Ariadne griped. Annabeth didn't answer. "ANNA!"

"Ok ok I get you're point, but honest to gods this is the first summer I've had in a long long while where my life isn't in mortal danger. Give me a break!" Annabeth whined back.

"You're supposed to be teaching classes, and you promised that you'd teach me how to shield throw like the Captain today!" Ariadne complained loudly.

Annabeth sighed. "If I promise to teach all my classes for the rest of the summer and train you, will you let me be lazy for one more day?" Annabeth asked.

Ariadne didn't respond, prompting Annabeth to lift her head to look at her sister's bunk, slightly too late.

"BEACHED WHALE!" Ariadne screamed as she flopped down on top of Annabeth.

"Oof!" Annabeth grunted as her sister proceeded to lie on top of her. Annabeth realized just how heavy a little over 100 pounds could be once it was lying on your back.

"Sister bonding time!" Ariadne laughed as she wrapped herself around Annabeth's waist, refusing to let go.

"Ariadne seriously I can't breathe!" Annabeth whined.

"That's unfortunate." Ariadne responded, still laughing. "Oooh what's that?" She asked, pointing to Annabeth's Gameboy advance that was sitting on top of her sister's trunk.

"You know what it is now get off!" Annabeth begged.

"What're you playing?" Ariadne asked, grabbing the Gameboy. "Green cartridge… Pokemon!" She squealed.

"If you mess up my team I'm pulling your eyelashes out one by one!" Annabeth threatened, trying to get from out from under her sister.

"Let's see if you like mudkips." Ariadne giggled as she started up the Gameboy leaning her head against Annabeth's shoulder as she put the Gameboy in front of Annabeth's face so they could both see.

"I don't even play with water types." Annabeth responded, watching Ariadne boot up the last save. "Well, not usually."

"Ok so we have a Blastoise as your starter named Percy. How cute." Ariadne said sarcastically. "And a Dragonite, Riachu, Scyther, Alakazam, and a Snorlax. I'd say this is a decent team. Except you're missing a Psyduck so it sucks."

"Haha give me that." Annabeth demanded as she attempted to grab the Gameboy from her sister's hands.

"Never!" Ariadne snatched it away before Annabeth could grab a hold of it. "Have you captured MewTwo yet?" She asked.

"No, I just beat the Elite Four." Annabeth answered.

"Oh I know what we're doing!" Ariadne said in glee. "Onward!"

"I swear to gods if you waste my master ball…" Annabeth started.

"It's fail proof." Ariadne sing-songed.

Annabeth sighed. "Fine, of we go."

"Yay!" Ariadne squealed. "So much better than Avenger training, which you're still going to do at some point because I said so." Ariadne grumbled.

Once they reached the MewTwo cave, Ariadne chuckled evily.

"That sounds pleasant." Annabeth said sarcastically.

"I live in a pokemon world and I'm here to be the greatest master of them all, now shut up and let me battle." Ariadne demanded. "Oooh look found it!"

"Please don't kill all of my pokemon." Annabeth pleaded.

"Aaaaaand master ball." Ariadne selected first, not even bothering to attack MewTwo. "Tada! Now you have MewTwo. Enjoy." Ariadne handed the Gameboy back to Annabeth. "Can we beat the Elite Four again?"

Annabeth sighed as Ariadne rested her chin on top of his sister's head. "Fine." And with that, they were off.

* * *

><p><em>This is late, I'm aware. However, we've been having terrible storms lately and my power was out for a whole day, and my internet out for 3. It's been hell attempting to get it back up, but we made it! Enjoy this chapter, because it was supposed to be longer but it got too long so I had to split it up. However, we're going to chapter 40 bitches! IT FEELS GOOD TO BE BACK! <em>


	33. Chapter 32

**Chapter 32: Annabeth Vs Gay Ignorance and Dads on Facebook**

"ANNABETH YOU OPEN THIS DOOR RIGHT NOW! YOU HEAR ME? RIGHT FUCKING NOW!" Thalia's screaming shot Annabeth out of a deep sleep. The day before had been long and full of things to do, much of it in the heat. She had gone to bed as soon as the nighttime activities and dinner were through, and had planned on sleeping in as she had no morning classes she had to teach. That is, until Thalia had other ideas.

"Ok ok holy crap! Hang on." Annabeth grumbled, pulling open the door after stumbling half asleep out of bed. "What?" She asked groggily, her eyes still half open.

"HE'S GAY!" Thalia spat out like a bullet.

Annabeth took a deep breath and rubbed her face, already unhappy with where the conversation was headed. "He had a crush on Percy, that doesn't mean he's gay." Annabeth argued, shuffling Thalia inside and taking a seat on her bunk bed.

"Tell that to the mass amounts of gay porn I found on his hard drive last night." Thalia grumbled as she fell over onto Annabeth's bed.

"Why on earth were you snooping in Nico's hard drive anyways?" Annabeth asked, appalled at Thalia's lack of privacy.

"It wasn't even like that, gods Annabeth I'm not a monster." Thalia argued, offended. "He told me we should watch a movie, and that he had a bunch of them saved to a file on his computer. He let me look through the collection while he ran off to the bathroom, and I accidentally clicked the wrong folder."

"How do you magically stumble across someone's porn folder?" Annabeth prodded, still not truly trusting that Thalia wasn't a total snoop.

"It's not that hard when the folder is titled 'other films.'" Thalia explained, using air quotes.

"Still doesn't mean he's totally gay though. Lots of Greeks experiment with both genders, it's really not uncommon. I mean half of Apollo's cabin hails to some form of the rainbow flag and Aphrodite's kids will pretty much flirt with anything that moves. Heck, even my sister is gay." Annabeth responded, stretching her limbs from sleep. She failed to see why Thalia was making such a fuss. "I mean, was it really all just gay stuff on his computer?"

"Well no, it wasn't but… ugh!" Thalia grunted into Annabeth's pillow. "I mean I guess he might not be totally gay but how I do know for sure?"

"He's with you isn't he?" Annabeth pointed out as she pulled clothes from her trunk to get ready for the day.

"Yeah but, that still doesn't make him completely strait." Thalia griped.

"No it doesn't. Look if this bothers you so much, why not just ask him?" Annabeth suggested, pulling on pants in a half asleep stupor.

"Ask him what? And how?" Thalia whined. "Hi Nico, do you enjoy dick as much as you enjoy…"

"I'm sure there's a better way to ask him about his sexuality that isn't so crass." Annabeth cut off before Thalia could finish.

"But even if he isn't totally gay, that still means more competition for me." Thalia groaned. "And he's probably going to be weirdly emotional sometimes like a girl."

"Jeez have you always been this intolerant?" Annabeth snapped, not liking where this conversation was headed. It suddenly dawned on Annabeth that Thalia had spent most of her life fending off monsters, stuck as a tree, and then in a man-hating hunter group. Thalia probably knew very little about current world trends.

Thalia looked taken aback at the comment. "I… no. I'm not! I didn't say I had anything against gay people…"

"But you're certainly not giving Nico much slack." Annabeth retorted. "So he likes guys too. So what?"

"I mean have you spent time with any gay dudes, Annabeth?" Thalia asked.

"Thalia, I live part time in San Francisco." Annabeth responded, getting exasperated with the conversation quickly. "Our neighbors are so gay they dyed their poodle rainbow colors for pride."

"See! That's what I mean. Gay dudes are so flamboyant and theatrical." Thalia griped, lying on her back on Annabeth's bed. "It's so not my style!"

"Oh come on! Like Nico is running around painting rainbows on things and blaring show tunes." Annabeth retorted. "Thalia you didn't even answer my question. How many actual gay people have you hung out with?" She pried.

"I… not many. Um, there were a fair amount of lesbians in the hunters but, you know, I haven't really been around too many dudes for the past several years." She confessed.

"So how can you say that all guys who like guys are flamboyant and effeminate? And how can you say that all guys who like guys are completely gay?" Annabeth asked, trying to make her point more clear.

"I don't know. It's just weird is all. I don't know how I feel about dating a guy who also wants to date guys." Thalia explained, looking guilty.

Annabeth suddenly had an idea. "Look, I have some blogs that I follow who are run by some gay guys. They're super nice and really popular on the internet for being huge LGBTQ advocates. Why don't we take a look at some of their stuff and you can see that queer isn't such a weird thing."

"Ok, I guess I can work with that." Thalia said, handing me my laptop.

"Alrighty, well here's someone you can start with. Tyler Oakley. He's a little sassy and flamboyant but he's really cool and really funny." Annabeth explained.

Annabeth and Thalia sat down and went through several videos from Tyler, and then moved on to What the Buck, and continued from there. She even threw in some Ian Harvey to introduce some trans people into the group. After a while, Thalia seemed to be enjoying herself.

"Ok, I get it a little better. These guys seem alright." Thalia agreed, smiling at some of the jokes.

"See, they're just normal people like you and me. They just happen to like the same sex." Annabeth explained, patting Thalia on the back. "I'm going to go work out for a bit before I have to teach my afternoon class. How about having a talk with Nico?"

"Alrighty, sounds good. I'll see you later." With that, Thalia walked out of the cabin into the morning.

Annabeth made her way to the weight room where she was greeted by Frank, who was busy benching weights the size of truck tires.

"Any particular reason you're using our gym and not your own?" Annabeth asked as she set her towel down on the leg press. She lived by one motto when working out; never skip leg day.

"During this time… of day… at Jupiter… the weight room… is always… jammed packed…" He said, grunting as he lifted his massive bar bell. Annabeth spotted him as he put the weights back on the holding bar. "I hope you don't mind."

"Not at all. I totally get it. This place becomes crawling with campers during afternoon free period." Annabeth said as she stacked her own weights on the leg press.

"Did you find Nico alright?" He asked, wiping the sweat off of his face and the bench with his towel.

"Yeah we did. He and Thalia are working their stuff out little by little." Annabeth said as she began to do leg presses.

"Impressive weight." Frank complimented, surprised at how strong Annabeth was for her stature.

"Thanks… comes with the… lineage… believe it… or not." She strained.

"Uh, you know, I thought Nico was, well…" Frank trailed off as he selected his next set of dumbbells.

"Yeah, well I guess he's not completely rainbow colored." Annabeth mentioned as she finished her set.

"Not that it's a big deal or anything. I mean, I was surprised that he was so worked up about it. What with living in the 21st century and being Greek and all." Frank mentioned as he curled.

"I think it comes with his time period. He's not from our generation, remember? There's still a lot of guilt he probably held." Annabeth explained as she set up for leg curls. Suddenly, her phone buzzed. She answered it.

"Hello?"

"Hello dear! It's your father. I wanted to talk to you about Facebook." Annabeth froze. Oh crap. She began to have a mini panic attack as soon as she thought about her dad on Facebook.

"Uh I can explain…" Annabeth started.

"No no no you're not in trouble, I was just wondering if you could maybe take a day off and come help me make one." He explained.

Annabeth sighed. She really didn't want her dad on Facebook or any social media site for that matter.

"Dad, why on earth do you need a Facebook?" She asked.

"Look, I may be older and not as cool as you kids, but I think that it would be good for me to get into social media strictly for communication purposes. I won't interfere with your life or your friends and I'm not going to try and make you look uncool." He explained. "Besides, it'll be good for me to see if my students are really studying or partying." He chuckled. Annabeth was still facepalming silently to herself.

She debated for a second. Yes, their relationship was better and being home didn't suck, and she did indeed live with them over breaks between school and camp, but at this moment she was at camp. And her father knew that nothing was going to take her away from camp unless absolutely necessary. Then again, it had been a while since they had seen each other. She sighed again and finally gave in.

"Ok sure. I'll be over tomorrow." She agreed.

"Excellent! I can't wait to see you! I'll tell your step mom to make sure your bed sheets are clean for your visit. Love you!" He said with glee.

"Love you too dad, see you soon." Annabeth said, and hung up the phone.

"Did your dad really just ask you to help him build a Facebook?" Frank asked.

"Yup, he certainly did."

The next day, Annabeth found herself in San Francisco via Jupiter and Pegasus. She arrived at the house's front door step, and rang the doorbell. Much to her surprise and almost annoyance, her stepmother opened the door.

"Annabeth, there you are! Your father and I have been excited to see you! He's just finishing up paperwork in his office and will be home shortly." She explained, ushering Annabeth inside and giving her a hug.

"Great, I'll just drop my stuff in my room real quick." Annabeth said, making her way down the hall to her bedroom.

Annabeth got into her room only to be greeted with her sixth sense that someone was watching her. Or two someones. "Mathew, Bobby… if you're in my room I'm going to find you. And when I do, if either one of you has any plans to ambush me, I'm going to hog tie you and stick you in the garage."

"You're no fun." Bobby complained as he stepped out of her closet.

"Hello Anna!" Mathew greeted as he hugged her around the waist. He had always seemed to have the better disposition of the two.

"Hello to both of you. Would you give me a second to get my stuff put away?" She asked. They both agreed and went on to the living room to play video games.

"I'm glad you're home." Mrs. Chase said from the doorway.

"Surprisingly," Annabeth said turning around to see her step mom, "it's good to be home for a bit."

"So," Mrs. Chase started as she sat on Annabeth's bed, "your father wants you to make him a Facebook?"

"Yeah, I guess so." She said, shrugging as she pulled out her laptop.

"Where'd you get that?" Mrs. Chase asked.

"Chiron gave it to me." Annabeth explained.

"He seems nice…" She paused, and Annabeth wasn't sure what she was going to say next. "So is he also a demigod or…?"

"Centaur." Annabeth answered, nodding. She had grown to appreciate that her step mom was indeed trying to understand Annabeth's second life outside of the house.

"Wow, that's pretty neat." Mrs. Chase said. The front door opened, and Annabeth's heart filled with both happiness and annoyance.

"You're home!" Mr. Chase called out from Annabeth's doorway as he rushed over to her and scooped her up in his arms and barraged her with hugs and kisses.

"Oh gods dad, be careful! Hello, yes good to see you too, put me down!" Annabeth protested, forgetting just how strong her father actually was.

"Yes yes alright, I forget you're not 7 anymore." He said smiling. "So, let's get some dinner and then we can start with this whole social media nonsense."

"Sounds good." Annabeth said, almost regretting the decision to help her dad out.

Dinner was fine. They had ordered pizza and the conversation was going well. Most of dinner was spent between Bobby and Mathew asking Annabeth questions on how camp was going, what monsters she had fought, how Percy was, if she had seen any unicorns, and many other questions that started to get old very fast.

"Boys, let's let Annabeth relax for a bit before we bombard her." Mrs. Chase said as she put the dishes away.

"Not just yet! We have an entire internet to sort out." Mr. Chase reminded his daughter.

"_Great," _Annabeth thought to herself, _"now I'm in for it." _

"Ok, so this is your profile."

"Uh-huh."

"You fill it with information about yourself."

"Ok."

"But don't post super personal stuff."

"Obviously."

"And you put a profile picture here."

"Ok, makes sense."

"You can make albums for other pictures. Like if you go on vacation, or whatever."

"Ah, I see."

"And you can post statuses here."

"Got it."

"You can also put links and stuff there too."

"Oooh that'll come in handy."

"You can play games on here too, but please don't spam people with invites to play with you."

"Sounds fair."

"You got it so far?"

"I think so."

Annabeth thanked the gods that her father and her were on level in terms of smarts, as putting a profile together wasn't so much of a chore with him. He seemed to get everything right away.

"So… can I add you?" He asked, looking at her hesitantly.

"I… yeah sure why not." Annabeth caved. It wasn't like she was posting anything way too out there for him to handle.

"Well, that should do it then." He said, posting a profile picture after sending Annabeth a friend request. "I suppose you'll be headed back to camp then?"

"Eh," Annabeth shrugged, "I've got some time. I'll stay another day."

"Ha! Brilliant! I'll break out the chess board!" Mr. Chase exclaimed with excitement. For once, Annabeth didn't feel annoyed with her family in the slightest.

* * *

><p><em>Where have I been you ask? Welp, that's kind of a hard question to answer. You see, I've been in college working on a television and film degree. As much as that sounds cool, and it totally is awesome, it is a lot of work. Being an adult requires a lot of attention. I've also moved out of my parents house, gotten a job, and am a full time student living on my own trying to make everything work. Also, I wasn't even sure after reading House of Hades that I could even continue this fic as it began to contradict a lot of what I had been writing about. But, I think I managed to get myself back on track. Updates will come monthly. Not really scheduled monthly, but once a month or more if I'm lucky, this fic WILL update. No skipping out. It's good for me to write, so, I'm back. And we're going to at least chapter 40, maybe more, who knows? I'm also working on the companion fic to this, <strong>Signed, Annabeth. <strong>That one will probably be out by late fall of this year. I'm not gonna stop writing, you guys. This is what I love. I'm here to stay this time. I love this fic more than anything else, and I love you guys just as much. You all make this worth while. 3  
>Also, who's stoked for Blood of Olympus? It's all coming to an end! So sad, but SOOOO exciting! <em>


End file.
